Dr Indigo Perry Finds Inspiration at the NES Artist Residency in Iceland
Throughout January, Senior Lecturer in Writing and Literature, Indigo Perry has been on a writing residency in the village of Skagaströnd in north-west Iceland. Indigo carried out fieldwork for her third memoir, Midnight Fire, at the NES Artist Residency. She is also experimenting in collaboration with other artists on text projections.
Of her experience, Indigo said, ‘I have been inspired by the extreme winter weather here, including powerful winds and snowstorms and by frequent viewings of the Northern Lights. I’m also finding that Icelandic music is influencing my writing’.
Indigo writes memoir in poetic, experimental forms. Her first book, Midnight Water (Picador) was shortlisted for Australia’s National Biography Award. Her second book, Darkfall (University of Western Australia Publishing) is due for release in April 2020. At NES, Indigo is working on her third book, Midnight Fire. It’s a memoir about the profound effects of grief. Since she has been at NES, and after seeing the phenomenon of iridescent nacreous clouds (glitsky), she has become interested in diffraction: the bending of light around objects. This is influencing her imagery and form in writing. She has also been inspired by the stormy weather, the changing skies, the rhythms of the wind and by Icelandic music during her residency.
Indigo also writes live in performance as part of a performance art duo called Illuminous. In that work, her writing is digitally projected over herself and her collaborator in a performance space as they improvise live. At NES, Indigo has carried out a series of text projection experiments with another artist, Sinéad Bhreathnach-Cashell. Some of those experiments in the NES studio and at the Skagastrond swimming pool are shown in the images here, along with some fragments of writing from Midnight Fire.
*All featured images supplied by Dr Indigo Perry