Tessa Laird Book launch

31 May 2018

Help us launch Bat from the Animal Series written by Tessa Laird! Please join the author at Buxton Contemporary to celebrate. Bat inspired cocktails will be served in the foyer and copies of the publication will be sold for $20 (cash only). Free book goes to the best bat costume!

Speakers: Tiriki Onus, Edward Colless, and Norie Neumark, with MC Su Baker.

Bats have been misunderstood and maligned in the West for centuries. Unfair associations with demons have seen their leathery wings adorn numerous evil characters, from the Devil to Bram Stoker’s Dracula. In Bat Tessa Laird challenges preconceptions about these amazing animals, combining fascinating facts of bat biology with engaging portrayals of bats in mythology, literature, film, popular culture, poetry and contemporary art. She also provides a sobering reminder of the risks bats face worldwide, from heatwaves and human harassment to wind turbines and disease. Illustrated with incredible photographs and artistic representations of bats from many different cultures and eras, this celebration of bats contains much to enthral converts and sceptics alike.

About the Author
Tessa Laird is Lecturer in Critical and Theoretical Studies at the School of Art, Victorian College of the Arts, University of Melbourne. Tessa was a noted New Zealand art critic for over twenty years, where she founded two important art magazines in the 1990s, Monica Reviews Art and LOG Illustrated. Her book A Rainbow Reader appeared in 2013.