Dr Penelope Jackson MNZM

Penelope Jackson is a New Zealand based writer, curator and art historian. Her non-fiction books have the common theme of art crime. They are: Art Thieves, Fakers and Fraudsters: The New Zealand Story (2016), Females in the Frame: Women, Art, and Crime (2019), and The Art of Copying Art (2022). Penelope has also curated exhibitions including the award-winning Corrugations: The Art of Jeff Thomson as well as three about the work of children’s book writer and illustrator, Dame Lynley Dodd (which toured to 23 venues across Australia and New Zealand). Former curator and director of Tauranga Art Gallery, Penelope is now the Chair of the New Zealand Art Crime Research Trust. In 2020 she was a recipient of the University of Auckland Michael King Writers Centre writer in residence. In 2023, Penelope became a Member of the New Zealand Order of Merit for services to the visual arts. She has a PhD in Creative Arts from Charles Sturt University where she is an Adjunct Research Associate. Several of Penelope’s short stories have been published and in late 2023, her anthology of 25 short stories titled One Degree Off: Stories of Singapore (Marshall Cavendish International) was published. In 2023 her book, The Art of Copying Art won The Best Book of the Year in the Art Writing and Publishing Awards.

Join us as Penelope reads from her books and stay for Open Mic for new works.