Veteran singer and poet Patti Smith has reassured fans that she is "fine" after collapsing during a presentation in Brazil and later returning to apologize to the audience for ending her show early. Images on social media showed the 78-year-old lying on the stage of the venue in Sao Paulo on Wednesday night. "I'm fine. You can hear I'm fine," she told the AP Thursday morning when reached by phone. "The whole thing has been grossly exaggerated."
She added that a statement she published on her Instagram, in which she said she had experienced post-migraine dizziness, speaks for itself. "I was checked out by an excellent doctor and was absolutely fine," she wrote. "Please do not accept any other account. With all the strife in the world, this explainable incident does not merit so much attention." The Cultura Artística Theater said that Thursday's evening performance would happen as scheduled. Smith has been in Sao Paulo for a two-day presentation of the "Correspondences" project with the Berlin-based group Soundwalk Collective.
During the performance, she recited some of her writings alongside musicians. She collapsed about 30 minutes into the event while reading a text about climate change, according to local media. She fell on stage and remained there for a few minutes before receiving assistance. "She clearly felt dizzy. She started moving backward and fell in a way—I think she tried to support herself on the microphone or the music stand. And everything fell on top of her," said Micheline Alves, a journalist present. Alves said that a doctor in the audience went onstage to check on Smith. "After a few minutes, we saw that she wasn't unconscious. She got up on her own."
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