Poetry Sydney presents an evening of poetry and performance by five women performance poets for one night only at the Hollywood Hotel. Fashions for Living puts mature women poets centre stage in the bespoke backroom performance area in Hollywood.

Intimacy in the poetic acts of memory, the itinerary of the imagination, the place of collection and the journey of recollection. A garment, discarded. A texture holding a text. As part of an aesthetic collection, recalling for us the person who inhabited its surface — the lively body that animated it. Calling attention to link their emotive impact along the experiential path of poets are five women on the Fashions for Living.

The event is sponsored by Eastside as part of the HQ Festival program in association with the Hollywood Hotel and TAFF Star Entertainment.

FASHIONS FOR LIVING: Intimacy in the poetry of five women

Devina Bedford is a writer, poet, photographer and performance artist. She was a newspaper executive for 20 years after being a former fashion model, film and television actress of 15 years. She has won three consecutive International Women’s Day Art prizes for combination installations of photography and prose, and has had two solo exhibitions. She has performed her poetry extensively and has seven poems published in five anthologies.

Dr Bronwyn Eather is a Sydney based musician, poet and writer from Tasmania. She studied acting for three years after a decade doing field research on indigenous languages in remote Arnhem Land. She spent almost two decades as a linguist in AI Technology. In late 2013 she embraced song writing and performs regularly with her band or solo or with her duo, and releases recordings of her music every couple of years. In 2020 she wrote I am magpie, a short lyric novel, set in Sydney in 1789-1791, incorporating some of the Aboriginal Language of Sydney. She has recorded the novel as an audiobook with narrative and musical compositions throughout, and published it on her website https://bronwyneather.com

Marie McMillan is a Sydney based spoken word performer, born in Dublin. She has presented her poems at festivals and events including Newcastle and Sydney Writers’ Festivals, the Irish Film Festival, and Joycean Bloomsday events. She was a guest poet at the 2019 Tasmanian Poetry Festival in Launceston. She was a finalist in six NSW Poetry Slam Finals and two Bankstown Poetry Slam Olympics. Some of her poems and short stories have been published and/or anthologised and been short/long listed in local and overseas’ competitions. She won the “So You Wanna Be a Writer” Competition at the Sydney Writers’ Competition, spruiking her fictitious crime novel about spousal drink-spiking and rape, The Lost Day – Under Newgrangesm, Europe Books UK.

Bee Perusco is a poet, singer, songwriter and one half of CHOO CHOO TOYS (original poetry, songs and performance). She has self- published an illustrated collection of poems called HOMELESS - a sea creature speaks. Bee has also had poems published in anthologies with poetry communities in Newcastle, Sydney and Melbourne. She is currently working full-time as a teacher and considering other options.

Lou Steer is a cabaret diva who takes her poetry to the people - at festivals, markets, museums and even graveyards. Known for her passionate expression, Lou speaks of hearts and flowers, but the hearts are fractured and the flowers have thorns. Lou has performed at many festivals, a highlight was performing to 100,000 people at Newtown Festival.. Her performance group The Fierce Violets was nominated in the Spoken Word category at Sydney Fringe Festival 2022. She was the convenor of Caravan Slam, the largest poetry slam in Sydney’s inner west, from 2015 – 2018. Her live performances can be accessed on YouTube and SoundCloud. Her poems are widely published in numerous anthologies.

Poetry Sydney:

Poetry Sydney nurtures innovation, discovery, and inspiration through the poetry of today. We present established, emerging and early career poets from diverse poetry practices. For more information please visit our website: poetrysydney.org

Poetry Sydney gives respect to the Gadigal people of the Eora Nation, the traditional owners of the land we live, create, meet and work.

Image detail credit: fille qui fleurit tôt, girls who bloom early by Laneikka Denne. All rights reserved 2022