Publication launch: Longer than a kite's tail

Join us for the launch of Longer than a kite’s tail, a zine-style publication comprising newly commissioned texts written in response to the exhibition What we choose to remember. With contributions by Hana Pera Aoake, Ivy Lyden-Hancy and Ngaio Simmons and design by Gabi Lardies, these poetic texts explore reimagined narratives and cultural histories from both personal and political viewpoints. Celebrate the launch with an evening of poetry readings by the participating writers.

This publication is supported by Laura and Stephen Dee.

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Hana Pera Aoake (Ngāti Mahuta, Ngāti Hinerangi, Waikato/Tainui) is a multidisciplinary artist and writer based in the Bay of Plenty. Hana's first pukapuka, a bathful of kawakawa and hot water, was published with Compound Press in 2020. In 2025 they published two books, Blame it on the rain with no more poetry in Australia and Some helpful models of grief with Compound Press. In 2026 they will publish a book of essays with Discipline in Australia and the rights to republish their book A bathful of Kawakawa and hot water have been acquired by Broken sleep books in the UK to be published in 2027. Their work has been published widely, including the Serpentine Reader, Granta, Art News, the New Internationalist, Metro, Un magazine and Cordite. Hana is a current PhD candidate at Auckland University of Technology, where their work explores the ongoing legacy of industrial poisoning in the Eastern Bay of Plenty. In 2014 Hana co-founded Fresh and Fruity with Zach Williams, an art collective and ARI which is now defunct. Hana occasionally co-organises Kei te pai press with Morgan Godfery.

Ivy Lyden-Hancy (Te Rarawa, Ngāpuhi, Ngāti Wairere, Samoa (Falefā), Tonga (Vava’u) hails from Papakura, South Auckland, and advocates for indigenous communities. Ivy is a poet that uses her craft to raise awareness of her lived experience as wahine Māori and Pasifika.

Ngaio Simmons (Ngāti Porou) is an educator and poet based in Aotearoa/New Zealand. He holds a bachelors in English from the University of Hawai’i at Mānoa. As a Māori poet born and raised away from Aotearoa, his writing digs into such themes as diaspora, identity conflict, and home. Having placed second in the NZ National Poetry Slam in 2022, Ngaio is also the 2023 Auckland Regional Slam Champion and the University of Auckland Slam Champion for both 2022 and 2023. His work has been featured in Contemporary Verse, ANMLY, the Academy of American Poets, and most recently in Haymarket Books’ We the Gathered Heat: Asian American and Pacific Islander Poetry, Performance, and Spoken Word, among others.

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Image: Design by Gabi Lardies.