Launch: ‘Portrait’
Yay! The ‘Portrait’ anthology has been launched! Created from the 2020 ‘Art & Words Project’ – a collaboration between myself, the Northern Beaches Libraries and Manly Art Gallery & Museum – it features 12 writers and poets, and 12 artists, in a themed collaboration devised and edited by me!
Last night, filmed speeches by myself, the Mayor of the Northern Beaches Michael Regan, and the executive manager of library services Melanie Gurney, were combined with footage of the final artworks and extracts from the writings, and premiered on the Northern Beaches Libraries YouTube channel. You can watch it over here.
In my speech, I wanted to voice how 2020 has been a difficult year for creatives. In any ordinary year, it’s hard enough to balance work, life and play, and then to add on extra time for creativity. But mindset is also key to the creative process. Ideas don’t come from nowhere. They take great skill and dedication to conjure from thin air. They need inspiration to form, research to solidify, concentration and deep thought to enrich, and commitment to manifest. Ideas are precious things and their creation is a delicate process, fraught with opportunities to give up, or to not even start.
So in a year like 2020, with all the concerns it’s brought us, creation has inevitably been a challenge. With so much on our minds, how do we foster the space or inclination to even seek inspiration? With fewer opportunities around, it’s also hard to generate the motivation.
However, every collaborator in the 2020 ‘Art & Words Project’ fought to find and embrace their creativity, and I would like to congratulate them all! Watch the launch and view the digital exhibition here:
Launch: ‘Oz is Burning’
I would also like to congratulate everyone who worked on another very special anthology launched earlier this week, this time including me as a writer. ‘Oz is Burning’ is an anthology of speculative fiction published to raise money for the 2019/2020 Australian bushfire disasters, and it features some of Australia’s most prominent speculative fiction writers. It’s an honour to be included with them.
From Suzanne Newnham’s strange look at how a person who hears fire perceives the conflagration, to Jack Dann’s and Ann Poore’s evocative poems, to tales of wonder and outrage, and Silvia Brown’s and Narrelle M. Harris’s poignant hopes for a better future, this anthology demonstrates the agony of a continent, but it also shows bits of dark humor and hope among the devastation. My story is called ‘Beef’ and here’s the blurb:
A parent’s greatest wish is their child’s safety; but this new global enemy is everywhere, and always was.
Both print and ebook copies are available worldwide via online retailers such as Amazon.
Most importantly, for every sale, the publishers B-Cubed Press will donate to WIRES, NSW Wildlife Information, Rescue and Education Service Inc.
The launch was online via a ‘Meet the Author’ event over here.
Friday 50 Flash
To celebrate all this amazing news, and because I was awarded two amazing grants to support my brand new on-demand writing & book creation courses, and since we’re all in this together, I’m passing on the love with a ‘Flash 50 Friday’ special: all adult courses for under $50, this Friday 18th September only!
Once enrolled you will have up to twelve months to complete your course.
Enrol on Friday 18th over here! http://www.zenashapter.com/courses/
I love sharing my knowledge and experiences with others. Yay!
Congratulations again ‘Portrait’ & ‘Oz is Burning’ authors!
Yay! Congratulations all!
Thank you, Zoya!