Masterclass with Mindy
A major highlight of the last few months was attending a Master poetry class/workshop with the immensely talented Mindy Gill at the Queensland Writer’s Centre.
About Mindy
Mindy's work has been recognised both nationally and internationally, by awards and fellowships such as the Queensland Premier's Young Writers and Publishers Award, the RMIT Visiting Poets Program, the CMI Arts Initiative in Chennai, and the Australian Poetry/NAHR Eco-Poetry Fellowship in Val Taleggio, Italy, amongst others. In 2021, Mindy was named Australian Book Review's fifth Rising Star.
Mindy's poetry and criticism have appeared in Award Winning Australian Writing, Australian Book Review, Sydney Review of Books, Griffith Review, Island Magazine, Australian Poetry Journal, Hecate, Cordite, Stilts, Rabbit Poetry Journal, Mascara Literary Review, Meanjin Plumwood Mountain, StylusLit, The Lifted Brow, The Penguin Book of Indian Poets, the Institute of Modern Art and the Queensland Art Gallery. From 2017-2020, Mindy was Peril Magazine's Editor-in-Chief.
This intensive session focusing on one poem of each of the three participating poets, was a brilliant experience.
I am applying workshop learnings to elevate not only the one we looked at, but some of my other poems, working from my strengths and to expand brimming ideas into extended poetic narrative. All fellow poets, Alexander McCallum, Mindy Gill, and Joanna Ward were inspiring.
Anthology
It was a thrill to make it into Oystercatcher One, edited by Steve Meyrick, in a new press inspired by Ron Pretty and continuing his legacy. This launches in a couple of weeks and preorders are available.
Writing Tribe – Johnno Awards & QPoetry
The Queensland Writers Centre, Christmas Party, Johnno Award and now also a poetry award night, was mega.
LJ likes to rally writing tribes, and create and celebrate team spirit going into each summer break and this year was no exception, and featured a deconstructed thread that metaphorically turned gold as the night continued.
This year also saw the life bucket moment of current Chair Jemma Polari, taking her on stage selfie with all attending included.
The Johnno Award is one of those ones were everyone nominated feels humbled to be included. It is focused on service and volunteer work to support writers and writing. It was an honour to know so many of the nominees. What brilliant people they are. So generous with their time to develop other writers.
This years Johnno recipient was Yvette Holt from FNAWN, who gave a moving speech, off script, wishing the award was jigsawed between all nominees, all mighty in their areas of contribution. She paid tribute to the Godfather of Queensland Poetry, David Malouf and shared some of her story including early journeys with Debra Dank.
There were poetry awards, ably presented by Jared Bruinstrop, who also emcd the whole evening. One of the most notable moments of this was Huda the Godesses’s powerful spoken word set conveying and lifting the voice of women, recognising artists and her grandmother, mother and aunties. And Damen O’Brien, opting not to give a speech but simply smile brilliantly and move off that stage.
And what is a Christmas party for the QLD writers centre without Charlie’s atmospheric piano, this years electronic keyboard sounding great.
Another four wonderful things were: learning more about the history of the poetry awards, from UQ Press; finding an old Far North Queensland friend (nominated for Johnno) Jacque Duffy in the audience; catching up with friends made at QPoetry; and the slide show of the year’s writing activities on a big screen!
I saw many fabulous kidslit buddies, storytellers, and had a few fascinating, but all too brief conversations, as is the case at such events where there are so many people to catch up with. Thank you for the warm hugs from several of the management committee members who I served alongside with for a couple of years. Great to see you all doing so well!
Thanks to all those who did chat, especially those who sought me out to do so, when I was having a quiet sit down after a long week!
I’ll add the photograph of me and LJ to this post soon. It was lovely LJ nabbed me on the way in to organise a picture. She is so sweet to former Chairs and remembers our service with gratitude and warmth. Was also lovely to meet the Oodgeroo Poetry award winner, Nathan Sentance and his partner.
Amazing to be part of the Quills.
Many thanks to the Writers Centre, poets, kids lit, Genre Con, staff, volunteers, all other creatives, readers, Arts Queensland and of course our families, and new and emerging writers. Love you all, you are my writing tribe.
June Paisa Perkins 