Book Launch | This Imperfect Light by Ben Brown

Shining on a selection of works from the poet Ben Brown and the artist Bill Hammond, This Imperfect Light is a collaboration born from too many glasses of wine in a bar between earthquakes.

Gathered together here are 31 years of words in no particular order, other than exactly where they should be. Brown is an avid story teller, amateur philosopher, and self-professed expert orator, known for enjoying the sound of his own voice.

This selection allows for quiet contemplation of a life lived imperfectly. The Māori Jesus and The Blue Blanket Boy wander freely through islands, sea-scapes, and the birds and bones of an artist’s imaginings.

Meanwhile,

I barter words for pictures with a man

who is a toymaker and a singer of birds

and ancient giants feather walking through

the red bones of these brazen hills.

Yes, he said.

I’ve worked

with a poet before.

It was a bastard.

Ben Brown (Ngati Mahuta, Ngati Koroki, Ngati Paoa) is an acclaimed writer, poet, performer and publisher who lives in Lyttelton, New Zealand. Born in Motueka, New Zealand, in 1962, he has previously worked as a tobacco farm labourer, market gardener and tractor driver, and has been writing and publishing since 1992. Brown is the author of an evocative memoir, A Fish in the Swim of the World, a number of children’s books, non-fiction works, and short stories for children and adults, many of which have strong New Zealand nature themes.