In 2010 poet and painter Jo Slade published a chapbook, The Artist’s Room (Pighog Press; ISBN 9781906309114). In her latest full collection, she expands on this theme, exploring The Painter’s House in its entirety.
The poems trace identity through language and image, with an instinctive appreciation of those important yet transient details captured by our eyes and ears. There is the passing of time and the seasons, alongside reflections on loss, and a reminder of the value of intuition in a mysterious, often chaotic world.
Jo Slade is the author of four previous collections, including The Vigilant One (1994; ISBN 9781897648322), nominated for the Irish Times/Aer Lingus Literature Prize, and City of Bridges (2005; ISBN 9781903392461), both published by Salmon Poetry. In 2003 she was nominated for the 2003 Prix Evelyn Encelot Ecriture Prize by the Maison des Ecrivains in Paris. Her poems have been translated into French, Spanish, Romanian, Russian and Slovenian. She lives in Limerick.