POETRY SPOTLIGHT: ‘the difficulty with honesty in the long-term relationship & the consequences thereof’ by Ali Whitelock

The first poetry spotlight of the year shines on Ali Whitelock’s poem ‘the difficulty with honesty in the long-term relationship & the consequences thereof’ from her latest collection A Brief Letter to the Sea About a Couple of Things.

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BEHIND THE BOOKS: Ben Sando on Bakowski & Bolton

This week, guest reviewer Ben Sando gives his impressions on the combined works of Peter Bakowski and Ken Bolton, including their most recent poetry collections Waldo’s Game and On Luck Street.

Ben Sando is an exhibiting artist based in Adelaide – mostly painting, mostly abstract – but has also worked with manipulated photographic images and made performance and installation work. His critical writing has appeared in various magazines, most notably a review of the Adelaide Biennial in Art Monthly and a major article on the photography of Ian North.

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BEHIND THE BOOKS: The Missing Dream Tetra

‘I was spellbound by this hallucinatory excursion through the uncharted, elusive terrain between unconscious states and wide-awake reality.’ – Robyn Ravlich

Dream Tetras, a collaboration between writer Mike Ladd and artist Cathy Brooks, combines experimental essays by Mike with extraordinary images by Cathy. The essays, which are inspired by snippets of dreams Mike has remembered, embrace randomness and coincidences with waking life. Cathy’s artwork responses are extrapolations of the essays, drawing on her extensive photographic archives and combining drawing, collage, painting and photoshop.

We are pleased now to be sharing a bonus dream tetra, written after the book was published.

Read this bonus content below.

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NEW RELEASE: The Adelaide Art Scene

The Adelaide Art Scene: Becoming contemporary 1939–2000 is a landmark anthology of new and archival writing on the Adelaide art scene across six decades. Margot Osborne, primary author, commissioning editor and fearless project leader speaks with Wakefield Press’s fearless leader Michael Bollen about Adelaide’s art scene – its past, present, and future.

Weighing in at 740 pages, and 2.88 kg, this landmark tome ‘could be considered Adelaide contemporary art’s Rosetta Stone’, says John Neylon of InReview.

Read Michael and Margot’s discussion below.

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GUEST POST: Robbie Brechin on Philip White

Blood on the Typewriter, Robbie Brechin’s ‘spiky, gossipy, loving and richly insightful’ biography of iconic wine writer and eccentric Philip ‘Whitey’ White, laid bare a life lived large.

Son of an Old Testament manic street preacher, Philip left home and dove headlong into bohemia when he was 17, and was in Paul Kelly’s first band, The Debutantes, among other adventures.

In this guest post, Robbie and Philip reignite their partnership, reminiscing on Philip’s life and health, and closing old wounds.

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