Charmaine Papertalk Green
Australian Indigenous artist and poet (1962–2025)
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Charmaine Papertalk Green Smith (1962 – 27 August 2025) was an Australian Indigenous poet. As Charmaine Green she worked as a visual and installation artist.
Charmaine Papertalk Green | |
|---|---|
| Born | 1962 Eradu, Western Australia, Australia |
| Died | (aged 63) Western Australia, Australia |
| Occupations | Poet, visual and installation artist |
| Writing career | |
| Language | English, Badimaya and Wajarri |
| Notable work | Nganajungu Yagu |
| Notable awards | Victorian Premier's Prize for Poetry, 2020 Western Australian Women's Hall of Fame, 2023 |
Background
Career
Poetry
A number of her poems were included in Those Who Remain Will Always Remember: An Anthology of Aboriginal Writing.[3]
Her work was included in The New Oxford Book of Australian Verse (3rd edition),[4] while her 2019 poetry collection, Nganajungu Yagu, won the 2020 Victorian Premier's Prize for Poetry.[5][6] Green won the 2020 ALS Gold Medal for Nganajungu Yagu[7] and was shortlisted in 2019 for False Claims of Colonial Thieves.[8] In the 2020 Queensland Premier's Literary Awards, Judith Wright Calanthe Prize for Poetry, she was shortlisted for Nganajungu Yagu.[9]
Her 2018 book False Claims of Colonial Thieves, co-written with John Kinsella, was shortlisted for the John Bray Poetry Award at the 2020 Adelaide Festival Awards for Literature.[10] In his 2018 review, Robert Wood wrote: "As a critique of colonial Australia and a historical document, False Claims of Colonial Thieves has a certain weight and importance".[11] She and Kinsella were interviewed by Claire Nichols for The Book Show on ABC Radio National.[12]
In 2023 Green won the Red Room Poetry Fellowship, valued at $5,000 plus a two-week residency at Bundanon. Her nominated work is Jugarnu Wangga Migamanmanha (Older woman making talk).[13] With co-author John Kinsella, she was shortlisted for the 2023 ALS Gold Medal for ART.[14]
On International Women's Day in 2023, Green was inducted into the Western Australian Women's Hall of Fame.[15]
Art
Green won the poster competition at the NAIDOC Awards in 2006.[8] She was represented by Yamaji Art Centre, Geraldton.[1]
Works
- Papertalk Green, Charmaine (2007). Just Like That and Other Poems. Fremantle Arts Centre Press. ISBN 9781921064128.
- —— (2014). Tiptoeing Tracker Tod. Oxford University Press. ISBN 9780195524413.
- ——; Kinsella, John (2018). False Claims of Colonial Thieves. Magabala Books. ISBN 9781925360813.
- —— (2019). Nganajungu Yagu. Cordite Books. ISBN 9780648511601.
- ——; Kinsella, John (2022). ART. Magabala Books. ISBN 9781922613738.
