Kirk Robson Award for Community Arts and Cultural Development
Congratulations Leah Jing McIntosh, recipient of the 2022 Australia Council Kirk Robson Award for Community Arts and Cultural Development!
Leah Jing McIntosh is a critic, researcher, and the founding editor of Liminal, an anti-racist literary platform that seeks to support and elevate racialised artists and writers, with a focus on the Asian Australian experience.
Over the last five years, Liminal has published over 200 longform interviews, and commissioned award-winning art and writing. As part of the Liminal project, Leah has published books, produced literary events, created mentorships and fellowships, and established national literary prizes, to create new spaces and opportunities for her community.
In 2020, she edited the critically-acclaimed fiction anthology Collisions (Pantera Press, 2020), and in 2022, she is editing Against Disappearance, a collection of essays on memory by First Nations writers and writers of colour (Pantera Press).
She holds a Master’s degree in English Literature from University College London, and is currently completing her PhD at the University of Melbourne. Her research is concerned with the possibilities of diasporic self-representation, and the fracturing of literary form.
Leah’s work is underpinned by an anti-racist, anti-colonial praxis, which means she sometimes gets into trouble. Trouble aside, she has been selected as a Victorian nominee for Young Australian of the Year, listed on Forbes Asia’s 30 Under 30—Class of 2020, Asialink’s inaugural 40 under 40 Most Influential Asian-Australians, and as one of the three inaugural Asia Society Melbourne Game Changers.
Meet the other recipients
The 2022 Australia Council Awards will be showcased on this page on 8-12 August 2022. Each of these artists in their own way reflect the vibrancy of Australia’s diverse cultural life.