Lionel Fogarty

Lionel Fogarty was born in 1958 on Wakka Wakka land at Cherbourg Aboriginal Reserve in south-east Queensland. A Murri man, he has traditional connections to the Yugambeh people from the area south of Brisbane and the Kudjela people of north Queensland

In the 1970s Lionel became involved in Indigenous rights, working with the Aboriginal Legal Service, Aboriginal Housing Service, Black Resource Centre, Black Community School and Murrie Coo-ee. He campaigned for land rights and protested against Aboriginal deaths in custody. 

Fogarty's first collection of poetry, Kargun, was published in 1980. He has since published a further thirteen volumes including the Scanlon Prize-winning Connection Requital (2010), Mogwie-Idan: Stories of the Land (2012), which won the Kate Challis RAKA Award, Eelahroo (Long Ago) Nyah (Looking) Mobo-Mobo (Future) (2014). Fogarty’s most recent publication Harvest Lingo (2022), published by Giramondo, was the winner of Queensland Literary Awards – Judith Wright Calanthe Award for a Poetry Collection 2023.

Fogarty’s is ‘a poetry of linguistic uniqueness and overwhelming passion’ repurposing both English and the language of his people to confront colonisation and celebrate a deep sense of Blak-pride.

More recently Fogarty's paintings have given visual presence to his poems. His paintings tell of encounters between people and between cultures, address historical and cultural issues and political events, and pay tribute to important Indigenous figures. Fogarty’s painted poems are intensely felt, bold and fierce and at times challenging and confronting.