About
Echo Location builds connections between people, places and ideas through creative research, projects and facilitation.
Echo Location is led by Kelly Lee Hickey and works with a network of independent collaborators and peers.
ARTIST BIO
Kelly Lee Hickey is an artist, researcher and creative producer of Irish and German ancestry. Her practice explores the intersections between people and place through writing, performance, and collaborative and participatory works.
An Australian poetry slam champion and winner of the Press Press manuscript award, she has performed at festivals internationally, including the Sydney Writers Festival, Ubud Writers Festival, Queensland Poetry Festival and Bookworm festival, with publication credits including Australian Poetry Journal, Rabbit Journal, Solid Air and Going down Swinging. She was the artistic director of the National Writers Festival (2007) and the Eye of the Storm Festival (2013) and has worked collaboratively across a range of mediums including radio, animation, quilting and cartography.
She has undertaken creative residencies nationally and internationally including at Rumata Art space (Indonesia) and Arteles (Finland). She has studied with the Emergence Network, Dulwich Centre, Zen Zen Zo and was a participant in the inaugural residential at A School Called Home (Sweden).
She was awarded a PhD from Victoria University for her research exploring the intersections between creative practice and community pedagogies in response to ecological and social crisis. She was the innaugural Creative Researcher in Residence at the Centre for Creative Futures (CDU) and remains an adjunct research fellow with the Centre until 2025.
BROADER PRACTICE BACKGROUND
My practice is collaborative, creative and participatory, with a commitment to building connections between country, community and critters.
I’ve worked across the creative, community and public health sectors for over 15 years, as a project and program manager, facilitator, evaluator and educator. I’ve designed projects independently and for organisations. I’ve worked as a consultant, joined and led creative teams, and worked within organisations. I’ve facilitated training for professionals, community meetings and panels at writers festivals. I love holding space, researching and translating ideas, strategic analysis, and creative development. I’m committed to social and ecological justice, regional communities, and collective healing and transformation.
I have over a decade’s experience and graduate qualifications in community development, with specialisations in public health, violence prevention and climate justice. I have specialist training in collective narrative therapy and worked alongside the Dulwich Centre Collective Narrative team on the Yia Marra project. I am a skilled facilitator and storyteller, working as a consultant for iTalk studios and the Alice Springs Women’s Shelter in narrative project development. I have delivered workshops in creative and therapeutic writing for the Red Room Project, NT Writers Center, Arts Access Victoria, Express Media and the Mental Health Association of Central Australia.
I was the artistic director of the National Young Writers Festival (2007) and Eye of the Storm Writers Festival (2013), and have worked as a creative producer on numerous other projects. I am an Australian Poetry Slam Champion (2010) and winner of Press Press Manuscript award (2011). My poetry and non-fiction writing has been published in Australia, China, Indonesia and New Zealand. I have toured extensively throughout Australia and Asia, including performances at the Bookworm Writers Festival (China), The Ubud Readers and Writers Festival, The Makassar International Writers Festival (Indonesia), the Byron Bay Writers Festival and the Sydney Writers Festival.
