indigo eli
poetry … performance … art
indigo eli is a multi-form poet
working within and without words
she is a
page poet
performance poet
visual poet
film poet
list poet … yep, she’s a wordplayer
indigo eli
is an independent Australian artist, writer and communicator
living and creating on Kaurna Yerta
Adelaide, South Australia
a raw poem is mist
at the most distant point
from words
I am intrigued by the personal and universal, by the things we discard and those we hold dear.
With a community arts background, an investment in the individual, a multi-form, sense-based, corporeal and/or conceptual approach … and interests including the intersections of art, health, ethics, law, space/s, science, symbolism and ritual, … I’ve been pondering … and producing work that considers human connection, objects, legalities, language, embodiment and knowledge, exploring the question: where are the boundaries between one form and another?
Favourite words currently include: oology, unknowing, flapdoodle … and of course sandwich.
Favourite Auslan signs: turtle … none of your business … and not my problem.
…
audiences are saying:
“sublimely evocative”
Jordana Lennox, GLAM Adelaide on The Poetry of Object 0.1
“as carefully structured as an egg shell”
Gretchen Miller, ABC Radio National
“her work is uncommonly thoughtful.”
Lucy Nelson, Noted Festival on I Noted this for you
“Great idea and real connecting.”
Caroline Reid on enveloping (the human) connection (in 36.5 letters)
“transgressive yet hypnotic”
Scott-Patrick Mitchell on (with(in)side) out
“exceeds the traditional limits of poetry…a true entertainer”
Tom Cassidy, Night Voices
“Indigo was awesome … I felt challenged by the poem but it was great!”
audience feedback, Body Image and Eating Disorders Forum
Women’s Health Statewide
“At last the veil was off … a fascinating insight … intriguing work!”
Sue Flemming, Professional Writing Co-ordinator, AC Arts
on ‘Indigo Eli: a process in development a development in process’
JUMP Mentorship showing, SPOKE Festival SA
“From stilt walking the streets of Adelaide to writing to street performing, it’s all an extension of her individuality. But poetry is her vehicle of expression.”
ABC local
“Thank you for the strangest yet funnest letter i have ever received”
“Have to say indi i have received no more than one or two letters in my life that were worth the postage. ….yours is top of the list”
postal project recipients
[your poetry] “clogged … the vacuum cleaner ”
Flinders University
…
‘By inverting the natural order of things, and in reconfiguring the mundane, she invokes the need to continually question how we inscribe meaning, how we can each defy or redefine, and how art can mould, cast and reinvent everyday experiences.
Her pieces signpost the limitations of language and media forms in the creation of meaning and identity; in moving beyond the constrictive nature of words and syntax. Eli creates her own unique language, a ‘poetry of the object’. In their ‘silence’ these pieces speak volumes…’
– Glam Adelaide on The Poetry Of Object 0.1
…
A multi-form poet, indigo eli’s work stems from the urge to document intangibilities and speak the unspoken. She is intrigued by the personal and universal, and creates as a means to explore, communicate and connect.
Working with a broad definition of poetry, and leaning toward the experimental, readjusting her tuning has been a consistent pattern. Like scrolling through radio stations, she finds herself at spoken word … written word … object art … textiles … the corporeal … the digital … and the everyday … trying to find the right frequency for each effort of using and inflating voice. Her wordplaying creations are published, performed, screened, encountered and exhibited.
indigo has presented at numerous festivals and received a variety of awards for her works on page, stage, and beyond. She is a three-time Australian Poetry Slam national finalist and co-founder of two literary-performance initiatives the nameless project and Spoken Word SA.
Awarded an Australia Council JUMP mentorship in 2011, indigo worked with ‘national treasure’ Margaret Cameron. This saw her refine definitions of the words ‘poem’ and ‘perform’ and led to her first solo visual poetry exhibition ‘The Poetry of Object 0.1’.
Her ‘creative documentation’, an assemblage-style collage approach incorporating written notes & observation, imagery, found objects, hand stitching & digital media has documented life, residency and festival, and landed in letterboxes around the world care of her ‘postal projects’.
Poems have been published in a variety of anthologies and literary journals, including Cordite, Australian Poetry Journal, Writ Poetry Review, Poetry d’Amour, Poem Atlas and Meniscus. indigo’s first small poetry collection ‘writing love songs to the moon’ won a publishing prize and is now only available on the black market. She transforms copies into visual art.
indigo has an Advanced Diploma of Arts in Professional Writing, training~experience in community art, circus, costume, textiles, dance, physical theatre, street theatre, inflatables, spectacle & events, arts admin and projects … and most recently, a Diploma of Auslan and audio description training.
indigo weaves access & inclusion creatively into her practice. There’s a connective thread between her secret mission to disprove the notion that poetry is, in itself, inaccessible, and to meaningfully connect with folk who are isolated; socially, geographically or otherwise.
Wanting to play with sound, but not exclude a d/Deaf audience, she has started experimenting with audio, video and access with hopes to create poems that will cater for Deaf, hard of hearing and hearing audiences alike.
indigo is the dye in your jeans. She unashamedly flirts with moonbeams … likes strong coffee and fluffy clouds.
… everything is transient …
values & approach
photo credits: Royce Kurmelovs (first two), indigo eli (the rest)
doodles, layout and design: indigo eli
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