Forward Prize shortlisted poet returns with a second collection tracing family, memory and art

In the Hollow of the Wave, the second collection by Nina Mingya Powles, examines orientalism, art and artmaking in a time of ecological crisis. Influenced by the lives of women artists, and combining textile art, collage and poetry, these precise, remarkable poems reflect on the material of living, the thread of stories and memories held within fabrics and garments.

Through museum and gallery spaces, Powles examines creation and craft as a radical act of love, reclamation and resistance to the shadow of colonial legacies and attitudes. Engaging with the work of artists such as Theresa Hak Kyung Cha, Yayoi Kusama, Etel Adnan and the fashion designer Guo Pei, these poems rework the notion of ekphrasis into something elemental and tactile, to find new ways of rendering shifting places, languages and selves; a thriving tapestry of nature and life in full and vivid colour.