About The Centre
The J.M. Coetzee Centre for Creative Practice brings arts practitioners together with researchers in English, the Performing Arts and the Visual Arts. We have particular strengths in the disciplines of Creative Writing, Literary Studies and Music.
The Centre seeks to foster creative practice in the University and the community, offering opportunities for artistic collaboration and research-based practice. By bringing together outstanding practitioners in a range of disciplines, we provide a cultural hub that encourages innovative new forms of collaborative artistic production.
Research on creativity and the ways in which the creative arts are taught at all levels of the educational system (primary, secondary and tertiary) are also research interests of key Centre members. Other current research examines the ways in which practitioners contribute to society, and the way they are treated within the cultural economy.
We host regular masterclasses with local, national and international writers and musicians, author readings and musical recitals, concerts and performances, academic conferences, residencies and a range of other public events.
Our patron
The JMCCCP is named after the centre's patron, Nobel Laureate J. M. Coetzee, one of the most lauded of living writers. J. M. Coetzee's work is an inspiration for the centre's activities in terms of excellence and engagement with social and political issues. Coetzee's novels frequently refer to the work of J. S. Bach and his writing also reflects Bach's style formally through the use of polyphony in novels such as Diary of A Bad Year, demonstrating the kinds of influences and interactions between music and text that the centre examines and takes as a model.
The Pole and Other Stories was published in 2023, and the Centre celebrated the twentieth anniversary of the Nobel Prize in Literature awarded to JM Coetzee.
Research themes
- Precarity and Creativity
In our era of increasing environmental and economic challenges, when the disparity between the rich and the poor has expanded, the lives of the most vulnerable have become ever more precarious. The J.M. Coetzee Centre for Creative Practice is interested in artistic and critical projects that examine how art responds to conditions of precarity. - Intermediality
The interconnectedness of media is transforming the way we interpret and engage with artworks, literary texts and musical compositions, thus transforming social and cultural environments. Our researchers are exploring methodologies that are changing the way we perform, archive and represent material objects or intangible heritage in relation to evolving historical narratives, social frameworks and technological potentialities. This theme is subdivided into three subthemes: Immersive Curatorship, Adaptation and Word & Music. - South/South
Inspired by its location in South Australia and by its patron’s assertion that ‘the South’ is a ‘unique world’, the J.M. Coetzee Centre is interested in practices of creativity and critique that emanate from the South.