PRESS RELEASE
The New Zealand Poetry Society presents Canada and New Zealand dual citizen and writer, David Geary. David is best known as a playwright but has also published short stories, and is described as ‘an occasional poet’. He is currently Writer in Residence at the International Institute of Modern Letters, at Victoria University.

He will be reading his amusing and entertaining poetry on Thursday 23rd October, at the Upper Chamber of Toi Poneke, the Wellington Arts Centre, at 61 Able Smith St.

The event is open to the public, and starts at 7.30pm with an open mic. There is a $5 entry fee ($2 for members of the NZ Poetry Society).

Grave of a Professor of Anatomy, Barcelona. Jeremy Rose

Digital Cameras: The Easy Way by Brian Miller

Lifelogs, $15. Reviewed by :JR

There’s an ongoing debate among journalists about whether blogging is a legitimate form of the craft and whether bloggers should be considered journalists. There’s a fair bit of professional jealousy and muddled thinking involved but it’s an important debate nevertheless. It occurs to me as I browse this short guide to digital photography that I’m not aware of professional photographers ever displaying a similar level of angst about the increasing number of amateurs showing their wares on the Net. Read more »

MEDIA RELEASE
The New Zealand Electronic Text Centre has made a digital version of New Zealand’s first encyclopaedia — complete with a vision of Friday night at an Eketahuna pub, a glimpse of prison life in 1897 and talk of teenage boys’ smoking rooms at church.The Cyclopedia of New Zealand, Volume One: Wellington Provincial District — which weighs 5.1 kilograms in hard copy — was produced in 1897 and is now online. Also available now is Volume Six: Taranaki, Hawkes Bay and Wellington. Read more »

Beggars and Choosers: The Complete Written Correspondence Between Richard Meros and Creative New Zealand – Volume One by Richard Meros

Reviewed by LEAH DURAN

While rejecting author Richard Meros’ first submission detailing the hollow pleasures of the capitalist system, Creative New Zealand employee Nestor Notabilis suggests Meros would be much more likely to get funding if he wrote a love story. Notabilis signs the letter, “Yours.” And thus begins the fictional, anxiety-ridden, two-year relationship between Richard Meros and Creative New Zealand, told through seven failed short story submissions and their related correspondence. Read more »

Handboek: Ans Westra Photographs

Blair Wakefield Exhibitions 2004, Reviewed by JEREMY ROSE

Handboek is the catalogue of an exhibition by the same name which has been touring New Zealand since 2004. The exhibition has reached its final stop and will be on show at the Calder and Lawson Gallery in Hamilton until October 26.

On the second-to-last page of photographs in this magnificent collection there’s an image of a Maori man taking a digital photo of four children in front of the lighthouse at Cape Reinga. It’s far from a typical Westra image: it’s in colour for starters and its dimensions are those of a 35 millimetre negative rather than the square negatives of her usual camera of choice the Rolleiflex. If it had been the final photo, it would be tempting to see it as a metaphor for the death of documentary photography or, perhaps, Ans’s way of saying that with Maori now at the forefront of documenting Maori it’s time for her to bow out. But, thankfully, it’s not. The final two images are classic Westra: black and white, square images of the foreshore and seabed hikoi. Read more »

Poem of the Week: A Concrete Conveyance Channel

From: Beauty of the Badlands by Chris Fell

Victoria University Books, October 2008, $25

Read more »