Illustrations of imagined, 21^st century patron saints are on show at the Poetry Cafe in London’s Covent Garden this week and next to accompany the launch on Wednesday 7 November of Maggie Butt’s collection, Sancti Clandestini – Undercover Saints. 

The exhibits are the result of a collaboration between Butt, who is deputy dean of art and design at Middlesex University, and staff and students at the university. Butt said: “When I first saw the visualisations, I was quite taken aback. Some were exactly how I had envisaged the saint, but others were so far removed from what I imagined.”

In her collection Butt invents new patron saints for “our new age, so I came up with modern patron saints for groups such as liars and rank outsiders. The poem about liars, for example, is about someone who lies to protect their loved ones, and the one about looters is asking whether our society is to blame.”

Entry is free to the Poetry Cafe exhibition, which runs until 16 November.