Recent highlights
Verb Wellington Home-Based Residency Recipient 2025
I’m one of the two inaugural Verb Home-Based Residency recipients .
Verb’s three-week residency supports a writer to complete a residency at home. This residency is for writers who are not able to travel due to personal reasons, such as those with accessibility needs and/or those with young children or care giving commitments.
Thank you so much, Verb Wellington!
EcoPoetry Evening at the PN City Library, 2024
I worked with the PN City Library to create a night of EcoPoetry discussion, with guest writers Janet Newman and Robin Peace.
(Above: Robin Peace and Janet Newman at the Ecopoetry Evening.)
We had a rich and roaming conversation about ecopoetry as a genre and about Janet and Robin’s approaches to writing nature as people who both tend large pieces of land.
Award-winning local writer Janet Newman co-edited, with poet and professor Robert Sullivan, a significant new anthology called Koe, which charts the development of a unique Aotearoa ecopoetry derived from both traditional Māori poetry and the English poetry canon. Janet is also the author of the ecopoetry book, Unseasoned Campaigner.
Author Robin Peace recently wrote her second book, Detritus of Empire. Drawing from Robin’s long career in geography the book explores the idea of introduced plants as colonisers, echoing the habits of humans. The book weaves Robin’s personal history with the complexities of living in a colonised land.
The Arts Nest, Art Trail Manawatū, 2024
(Above: Here we are looking a bit manic and dishevelled after many hours of exhibition installation, the night before the trail began. Photo by Marolyn Krasner.)
A collective exhibition by Cheleigh Dunkerton,
Helen Lehndorf and Marolyn Krasner, artists
who make work around themes of nature,
community and healing. Our exhibition featured
paintings, mixed media piece and cyanotype.
‘From the 4410 to the 4412: a collaborative mixed media performance’, 2021
I co-wrote a multi-media performance show, ‘From the 4410 to the 4412′, with Marolyn Krasner and Charlie Pearson, for the Papaoiea Festival of the Arts in 2021 .
Listen to us talk to Pip Adam about the show on the Better Off Read podcast.
Palmy Zine Fest, 2020 + 2021
I co-facilitated Palmy Zinefest in 2020 and 2021, despite the pandemic doing it’s best to thwart us! alongside Chris Love, Brydee, Alice Fennessy, Charlie Pearson and the artist, Ilovescreamingmonkeys
(The beautiful 2020 posters below are by Alice Fennessy.)
Verb Festival, 2019
I chaired the event Climate Changing Fiction. We discussed art as activism and imagination as a vehicle for hope.
The latest works from Jeff Murray (The Melt), Lawrence Patchett (The Burning River), Maru Nihoniho (Metia Interactive) and Elizabeth Knox (The Absolute Book) all explore our world in the wake of climate catastrophes.
The Sketchbook Project, 2018
I took part in a Manawatū initiative for local artists to fill sketchbooks for the New York-based Brooklyn Art Library Sketchbook Project.
Read a newspaper article about our project.
(Above: Here’s the cover of the sketchbook I submitted.The future of the Brooklyn Art Project is up in the air…so goodness knows where in the USA it is now.)
Bags and Badges for National Poetry Day Workshop, National Poetry Day, 2018
A collaboration with the Palmerston North City Library’s new maker space Blueprint. I led a 2-hour writing workshop which culminated in the writers making poetry bags and badges. So that we could write short enough to fit on a bag or badge, we explored the haiku form.
(Above: One of the poetry bags made by a workshop participant.)
The Kapiti Writers’ Retreats
I have taught writing and yoga at the Kapiti Writer’s Retreats for seven years.
Read me answering five quick questions ahead of the 2021 retreat.
Read me answering five quick questions ahead of the 2022 retreat.
He Tohu: Rob Thorne + Helen Lehndorf, 2016
Rob Thorne and I were invited to collaborate on a words + music performance, He tohu, by the Palmerston North City Library.
The performance was devised over the week leading up to the performance and featured Rob’s nga taonga pūoro instruments, loop pedal and my poetry.
Black River: A Collaboration in Print & Poetry, Te Manawa Museum of Art, Science & Heritage, 2015
Inspired by Ralph Hotere’s collaboration with poets, Te Manawa commissioned selected local artists and poets to actively engage in a collaborative process.
The participants, all who have a connection to the Manawatū region, were me, Israel Birch, Leonel Alvarado, Rachael Garland, James Brown, Heather Partel, David Pearce, Johanna Aitchison, Ngataiharuru Taepa, Gavin Reedy, Virginia Warbrick, and Tim Upperton. Poets were paired with artists to make new work relating to the river.
I wrote a poem, Mudlark, for the exhibition and was paired with artist Rachael Garland.
Eyes in the Skies: Seven Poets, Seven Prints for Matariki, 2009
A collaboration with artists Virginia and Warren Warbrick. Seven local poets -the ‘seven sisters’- wrote from seven prints by Virginia Warbrick. The poems and prints were exhibited at Square Edge, Palmerston North and culminated in a multimedia poetry and nga taonga pūoro performance by Warren Warbrick.
I wrote a poem for the exhibition, Garlic Planting Time, co-ordinated the poetry and assisted on event production.
Helen Lehndorf 