A poet, publisher of Rochford Press and co-editor of Rochford Street Review, as well as an emerging artist, Linda Adair grew up on Dharug country without knowing whose land she stood on. She now lives and works on Dharug and Gundungarra lands in the Blue Mountains, Australia, and pays her respect to the Traditional Custodians of the unceded Country which always was, and always will, be Aboriginal land. Her debut poetry collection, The Unintended Consequences of the Shattering, was published in 2020 by Melbourne Poets Union. Her poems have been anthologised in To End All Wars, Messages from The Embers, Poetry for the Planet, Pure Slush Volume 25, Work! Lifespan Vol 5 and have been published in Bluepepper, The Blue Nib, FemAsia, Meusse, Ozburp, and most recently in Live Encounters Poetry & Writing. As a resident poet at BigCi in 2022, Adair researched the failed shale-oil mining town Newnes and wrote poems and painted canvases to consider the childhood point of view of her favourite aunt in that dour town during the 1920s and ’30s. That work was exhibited as Finding Jesse of Newnes at DIP (Darlington Installation Project) in September 2022. Adair was consequently invited to read her poetry to conservationists, historians, rock climbers and adventurers, not the usual poetry audience at The Back to Newnes Weekend in November 2022. During a Varuna Residency in April 2023, she began work on a verse memoir of her family’s complex relationship to unceded land. Some of the poems she worked on were published in the May issue of Live Encounters Poetry and Writing. Three short poems and three canvases referencing these concerns were part of Together or Otherwise A(part) the MAPBM (Modern Art Projects Blue Mountains) members group show at Articulate Project Space in Leichhardt, NSW. She is keen to take poetry out to a wider audience through connections with her visual art. She was a featured poet at ‘The Poetry of Rethinking’ event in May at Poetica at La Mama Courthouse.

To Purchase The Unintended Consequences of the Shattering:  https://rochford-pressbookshop.square.site/product/the-unintended-consequences-of-the-shattering-by-linda-adair/13

Picture: Mark Roberts

Production and Interview: Tina Giannoukos