I was very pleased to find out recently that one of my poems will be performed at this year’s  Manawatu Festival of New Arts, having come third in Massey’s “Poetry for Performance” competition. The festival (which is biennial) will run from 2nd – 10th October 2010 in Palmerston North. You can read a review of the last festival here: Manawatu Standard

The poets whose work will be performed are:

Elena de Roo (1st)
Robynanne Milford (2nd)
Janis Freegard (3rd)
Rex McGregor (highly commended)
Jim Lindsay (highly commended)
Sacha Norrie (highly commended)

Judge Karlo Mila also awarded distinction to Aleksandra Lane and Donna Banicevich Gera.  Here’s a link to the judge’s report. 

There was also a competition for playwrights and the following will have their plays performed at the festival:

Div Collins
Sally Sutton
Jan Watts
Tristan Domican
Denis Edwards
Isla Borrell

Judge Gary Henderson’s report here.

A requirement of the competition was to provide an “outline of the performance concept” which really made me think about the poem in a different way.  Usually I only consider how a poem looks on the page, so it was quite a luxury to be musing on possible visual/musical accompaniments.  I’m really looking forward to attending the performance in October and seeing how everyone’s work has been interpreted.