Jacqui Malins

Jacqui Malins is cross-disciplinary artist, whose practice incorporates poetry and spoken word, performance, video, sculpture and installation, drawing and photography. Clay is the medium with which she has the longest relationship as an artist, but it is now just one strand of her ideas- and process-driven practice.

Jacqui is concerned with how identity is formed, grows, changes and persists over time, and how our interior experiences of identity and emotion align or contrast with external appearance and our social and physical environment. Her longstanding interests in science and nature and the environment, and their interrelationship with culture, are emerging as more prominent concerns, evident in her 2023 exhibition ‘Wrack and Salvage’ and 2022 performance work ‘Matter of LIfe’.

Jacqui writes and performs a diverse range of poetry and spoken word, has featured at events and festivals including the National Poetry Month Gala 2022, Poetry on the Move, Woodford Festival, National Folk Festival and been a winner or finalist for several awards. She has been published in a range of journals and anthologies and her debut poetry collection was published by Recent Work Press in 2021. She has developed and performed several spoken word shows, Cavorting with Time with cellist Julia Horvath, Words in Flight (developed with director Ruth Pieloor), and Con/Form and Matter of Life, two shows performed live with video projections. Jacqui also curates and produces a range of poetry events and delivers writing and performance workshops.

Jacqui is involved in the production and facilitation of arts and literature events in both voluntary and professional roles. In 2023 and 2021 she directed and produced the Poetic City Festivals in Canberra, supported the ACT Government and City Renewable Authority Placemaking Grants. In 2015 Jacqui founded Mother Tongue Multilingual Poetry, organising and facilitating events that provide a platform for new and established poets in languages other than English, and she has been involved in organsing, curating and staging a range of one-off and regular poetry and arts events.

Jacqui also does a range of writing for business and government, including report writing and recruitment scribing.

You can contact Jacqui on jamalins@gmail.com