Claire Beynon is a South African-born artist, writer and interdisciplinary researcher who has lived in Dunedin since immigrating to New Zealand in 1994. In addition to a well-established solo practice, she works collaboratively on a diverse range of projects with fellow artists, writers, scientists and musicians in New Zealand and abroad. Two summer research seasons in Antarctica (2005 and 2008) led to valued collaborative partnerships with US scientists. Her experiences in the remote Dry Valleys landscape continue to inform her work.

 

A published and award-winning writer of poetry, essays and short stories, Claire's first collection Open Book - Poetry & Images was published by Steele Roberts in 2007.  For five years she and Mary McCallum (Makaro Press | The Cuba Press) co-curated an international poetry collective titled Tuesday Poem (www.tuesdaypoem.blogspot.co.nz), bringing together poets and readers from New Zealand, the USA, UK, Australia, Italy, France and Lesotho.

 

Claire is the founder-curator of Many as One, an Arts and Peace initiative whose purpose is to facilitate on- and off-line networks of creative exchange (www.manyasonemao.com). One of nine artists and writers invited to participate in the Caselberg Trust’s inaugural Breaksea Residency (2007), she has been actively involved in Trust activities since that time. She recently moved from West Harbour to a cottage in Broad Bay, a short distance from the Caselberg House, former residence of Anna and John Caselberg. The house and newly built Charles Brasch Studio is now the base for Caselberg Trust’s Creative Connections artists, writers and composers in Residence. In 2016, Claire and Alan Roddick edited the Trust’s first International Poetry Competition Anthology, the unexpected greenness of trees. This collection is the first to be published under the Trust’s own imprint - the newly-established Caselberg Press. 

 

Claire's manuscript For When Words Fail Us | A small Book of Changes has been accepted for publication in 2024, with The Cuba Press. 

 

Endorsements from the back cover of OPEN BOOK – Poetry and Images:

 

"Claire Beynon already has standing both as a poet and as a visual artist working in a variety of media. But she is rare in being one of the few able to bring their own words and images together in a striking and memorable way. If there is one word I would used for her work, it is 'innovation' and her new book has that in spades." Philip Temple

 

"Poems to carve on the palm..." Penelope Todd

 

"Here is a project that is adventurous in both conception and execution; the absence of pagination suggests one continuous page that will enchant the audience. In Claire Beynon's OPEN BOOK the artifice of wit is set alongside (not against) the unsteady pressure of the personal. Here words are historical burrs that, like the rough edges of lines made by an engraving tool, catch the world and turn it around. They enlarge our sense of what's possible. As she observes of earth and air; 'There's is a relationship refined by this curiously lyrical insistence.'" David Howard

 

“This is poetry that is assured, confident and rich in imagery…Claire’s writing has a lyrical, musical and sensory quality. She has an enviable ability to vividly recall and evoke place and sensations.” Kay Cooke

 

Claire's website: www.clairebeynon.com

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