Introducing our Poet in Residence

In recent years, there has been an increasing focus on the written word at the Art Gallery of Ballarat.  This has included poetry recitals relating to selected exhibitions as well as In Conversation sessions with prominent writers in conjunction with the Wheeler Centre.
Following on from the success of Barry Breen's Let's Talk Poetry series through 2012, the Art Gallery of Ballarat invited him to become our Honorary Poet in Residence for 2013.

Barry has worked variously as a schoolteacher, editor, drama lecturer, writer-in-residence and as an actor and director. He has published two collections of his own poetry as well as eight other books of short stories and poetry for schools. His poems and stories have appeared in most of Australia’s literary papers, journals and anthologies as well as in Ireland and Great Britain. He has held an Arts Council Senior Literary Fellowship and received the Poetry Australia Award and an Age Short Story Award among other prizes for poetry, short stories, children’s stories and acting.

In my role as poet-in-residence at the Gallery, I aim to write poems that describe, interpret, reflect on and are inspired by works of art. My poems may relate directly to a particular work or be more broadly reflective of the Gallery’s collections.

My modus operandi is to look, think about, talk about, let ideas come, note down descriptions and ideas, shape, edit, polish and eventually publish.

I hope that my poems will both please and reflect the style of the artist and that Gallery patrons and others will enjoy them.

-Barry Breen, March 2013