This web page is designed to provide a glimpse into the diversity and imagination of Alison Marshall’s works, with a selection of poetry, lyrics, recordings and doodle art.

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With a lifetime of adapting to her disabilities, Alison forged her unique perspective and intellect, and came to regard long periods of illness and isolation as an opportunity to develop her creative pursuits. These circumstances resulted in a substantial collection of both written and visual works. Her recent focus has been on writing and illustrating a children’s fable in novella format.

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Alison draws on a range of styles and forms, often sourced from her academic studies in Cultural Anthropology, Theatre Studies and Philosophy, placing equal importance on preserving traditional methodologies while exploring contemporary expressions of the vernacular.

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Alison is part of a wider community of poets, musicians and actors who share mutually supportive relationships, working together to have new works performed or exhibited. These performance-based projects give expression to Alison’s diverse range of skills, with each element adding a layer of meaning, a recapitulation of the theme and metaphor, complimenting the total theatrical experience. With her poem Instinct, written for the Sydney Fringe Festival, Alison performed her poem, illustrated her background screen, and composed and played the piano accompaniment.

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A rich collaboration with composer Peter Urquhart led to the Mid-Season Recital Series. This provided a much-needed platform for Sydney composers to have new works performed. As part of the series, Marshall and Urquhart co-authored the song cycles Songs of A Neon Alleyway (2011) and Songs of Renewal (2010), to public and critical acclaim.

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Alison contributed lyrics and libretti to the Sydney Conservatorium of Music Composition Unit at the request of Professor Matthew Hindson, Chair of Composition (2009–14). Her work is recognised for its “settable” lyrical quality. These texts are used by SCM Composition students as catalysts in the development of new musical works.

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Sometimes declamatory but always lyrical, Alison Marshall’s poetry is composed of kaleidoscopic, light-coloured sonic fragments that simultaneously echo the Romantic and Symbolist poets of the nineteenth century, as well as contemporary theories of Plate Tectonics, Archaeoastronomy and Nanoscience. Marshall’s poem Time Fix (Musepie Press), for example, is a sophisticated meditation on the development and use of the Fibonacci number series.

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Alison’s unique perspective and sensibility are mirrored in her abstract illustrations, inspired by Mr Squiggle (Norman Heatherington, 1921–2010) and Picasso. Her no-rules, anarchistic approach focuses on symmetry and colour. Her works are essentially automatic drawings: psychedelic, intricate doodles that allow and invite individual interpretations. All views are equally valid.

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Alison’s ambition is to give voice to a resonant and familiar expression of our shared humanity. Exploring the spectrum of human emotions, set amidst the furies of our times, her works transcend political, religious and national dogma to illuminate the common thread that unites us all.