Keynote Speaker: Michael Leunig

A rare treat. The Keynote Speaker at Golden Plains 8 is the cartoonist, writer, painter, philosopher and poet Michael Leunig.

How about that?

We are thrilled to the back teeth that our invitation has been accepted by the comparatively private man whose commentary on political, social and emotional life over more than forty years is known and loved by so many.

He describes his approach as regressive, humorous, messy, mystical, primal and vaudevillian – producing work which is open to many interpretations and has been widely adapted in education, music, theatre, psychotherapy and spiritual life. That work has often explored the idea of an innocent and sacred personal world. The fragile ecosystem of human nature and its relationship to the wider natural world is a related and recurrent theme.

The title of the Keynote Address is Spirit of Country and Sleeping Under the Stars, which is something nearly every Golden Plainer does for two nights out there on the proud fields and bushy edges of the Nolan farm.