We’re delighted to announce the successful applicants to our mentoring program for emerging curators of writing events from culturally diverse backgrounds. The successful applicants are Alejandra Martinez, Greg Page and Simone Amelia Jordan, as well as returning curators Tina Huang and Zohra Aly.
The emerging curators will program sessions for the Boundless Festival 2023 event series under the guidance of writer, editor, producer and curator Sheila Ngọc Phạm. The Boundless Festival was established by Writing NSW in 2017 to provide a platform for Indigenous and culturally diverse writers.
The program gives emerging literary curators from First Nations or culturally diverse backgrounds the experience of programming an individual event in our Boundless Festival 2023 event series, along with support from Writing NSW and guidance from Sheila Ngoc Pham, writer, editor, producer and curator of literary events including for The Finishing School, Writing NSW and Addi Road Writers’ Festival.
The 2023 Boundless program will build on the success of previous festivals, and reach out to new audiences, through a series of stand-alone events curated by the successful applicants to the Writing NSW development program, and staged in different geographical locations between August and November 2023. The full program will be announced in July.
Emerging Curators
Returning Curators
Alejandra Martinez is an Australian-Uruguayan writer. Her stories have been published in a range of anthologies and magazines, including Best Australian Stories (Black Inc), Girls Talk and Puentes Review. She has also written short plays, one of which was performed at the Riverside Theatre in Parramatta. Her writing explores migration and universal themes of identity, loss, ageing, mental health, and resilience. She was the winner of the 2022 Newcastle Writers Festival Fresh Ink Emerging Writer Prize.
Greg Page is a Koori poet from Warrung/Sydney. He holds an MA in Creative Writing from UTS in Sydney and has been published in the Australian Poetry Journal, Overland, Mascara Literary Review and the Koori Mail. He lives on unceded Bidjigal land and has never been a member of The Wiggles.
Simone Amelia Jordan is a hip-hop journalist with a career spanning print, radio, TV, and digital media. At 23, she founded Urban Hitz, the country’s highest-selling rap and R&B publication. Later, in New York City, she served as the content director of The Source, the iconic ‘Hip-Hop Bible’ that inspired her reporting and social consciousness. Simone is a passionate advocate for equity and inclusion, dedicating her career to mentoring young women and guiding the next generation of talent at Media Diversity Australia. Her debut book, Tell Her She’s Dreamin’, won the 2021 Richell Prize.
Tina Huang is a Chinese Australian writer based in Sydney on Wangal land. Her writing has appeared in publications such as Meanjin, The Lifted Brow, Going Down Swinging, Cordite Poetry Review, Overland, and Peril. Tina is also a performance poet and was a 2021 NSW State Finalist in the Australian Poetry Slam. In addition to her writing and performance poetry, Tina also curates literary events. Tina was one of three emerging curators for the 2021 Boundless Festival, and in 2023 was a guest curator of the Addi Road Writers’ Festival. Tina is passionate about pushing the boundaries of traditional festival-making and experimenting with formally innovative events.
Zohra Aly lives in Sydney on Dharug land. She worked as a hospital pharmacist for several years before becoming a freelance writer. Her features have been published in Sydney Morning Herald, Sunday Life, MiNDFOOD and Helix. Zohra has an MA in Creative Writing from UTS. Her essays have appeared in Sydney Review of Books, Meanjin and Island. Her short fiction has appeared in the UTS Writer’s Anthology Empty Sky and she was on the editorial committee for the commemorative edition of the UTS anthology 40. In 2021, she was an emerging curator for Writing NSW’s Boundless Festival and in 2022, she chaired a panel in the Australian Muslim Writers Festival. Currently, she is a mentor for emerging refugee writers with the South Coast Writers Centre, as well as guest curating for the South Coast Writers Festival.
Boundless Festival History
The Boundless Festival was established by Writing NSW in 2017, in partnership with Bankstown Arts Centre and Sweatshop. The first Australian festival to focus on First Nations and culturally diverse writers, the biennial event gives a platform to established writers and emerging voices from a rich array of genres and styles. Authors, writers for performance, journalists, poets and interdisciplinary practitioners come together to discuss the important issues of our times and the value of story.
The 2019 festival won FBi Radio’s SMAC award for Sydney’s Best Arts Program. In 2021, the festival was further enriched with the launch of a new Writing NSW development program for emerging literary curators. Curators Zohra Aly, Annie Brockenhuus-Schack and Tina Huang designed the festival under the guidance of Sisonke Msimang, curator of the literature and ideas program at Perth Festival. Covid restrictions meant the 2021 festival had to be reimagined as an online event, attracting an enthusiastic audience from around the country.
More information about previous Boundless festivals can be found here.