Upcoming artists-in-residence: The Happy Mondays - Jodi Vial, Josepha Dietrich, Betty O'Neill and Catherine Johnstone

The Happy Mondays: Josepha Dietrich, Catherine Johnstone, Jodi Vial and Betty O'Neill 

The Happy Mondays are a group of writers, Josepha Dietrich, Catherine Johnstone, Jodi Vial, and Betty O'Neill, who met last year through an online Varuna course titled Finish Your Memoir in 2024. Despite the geographical distance of being from three different states, they have continued to develop support and friendship following the nine-month online course. Now they will meet for the first time in-person for their group residency at Gunyah. 

"... During our residency at Gunyah, we plan to continue our process of working together, which began with the Varuna course. Being part of a writing collective has been transformative for each of us. This Gunyah residency is a rare chance to write together in the same place. Alongside our individual projects that we will each be working on, we will develop our collaborative 'project' of building a writers' collective, expanding on the many benefits of support, feedback, workshopping and company in the writing process. We’re looking forward to spending part of each day of the residency coming together to explore this. ..."

Jodi Vial, with her microfiction The Span (published in the Landmarks anthology) at Newcastle Writers Festival 2016


Jodi Vial lives and writes on unceded Awabakal Land, Newcastle NSW. She recently graduated with a PhD in Creative Writing at the University of Newcastle, with a focus on the intersection of literature, landscape and history. Her work has appeared in poetry anthologies by Spineless Wonders, Papatanuaku Press and Recent Work Press, and her short story cycle Lives of Girls and Women was acquired for UON’s permanent art collection in 2018. Her prose poetry has been shortlisted three times in the Joanne Burns Prize as part of Newcastle Writers Festival, most recently in the 2025 prize.

"... During my residency at Gunyah, I’ll be working on the creative manuscript that formed part of my PhD thesis, 'All the Water a Body Can Hold', to reframe it for potential commercial publication. I will also be working on a book of prose poetry, refining my technique and approach to the form. ..."

Josepha Dietrich, In Danger: A Memoir of Family and Hope, UQP, book cover


Josepha Dietrich lives on Turrbal Land, Brisbane QLD. Her recent book, In Danger, was published by the University of Queensland Press (UQP). She works in Intelligence and Engagement at UQ, and is also a freelance editor. She previously worked as a university research assistant on improving psychiatric discharge planning and women’s wellness after cancer. Her prior long-term work was in assessing children’s and adolescents’ risk of harm alongside the Sexual Offences Child Abuse Unit of Victoria Police. To remain sane during this period, she flitted off overseas for months at a time to climb cliff faces while sleeping on beaches or in abandoned shepherds’ huts.

"... During my residency at Gunyah, I hope to leverage the support and knowledge I’ve gained in 2024 as part of a professionally guided writing group to further develop my speculative memoir manuscript. The writing group provides critical feedback on one another’s memoir development as well as the incidental support of working alongside one another. ..."
Stories of Place, book cover, 2025,
Anthology of short fiction, with stories by Catherine Johnstone 

Catherine Johnstone is a queer writer from Wurundjeri Country, Melbourne VIC. She has a long association with the writing industry, having taught screenwriting and professional writing and editing. She has written and directed award-winning short films and received the Fiona Myer International Travel Award to work on her art in Venice, Italy. She has returned to writing fiction and creative non-fiction and in the last two years has been awarded writing fellowships at Varuna and KSP in Perth. She has been published in literary journals Meniscus and Westerly, and is shortlisted in the 2024 City of Melbourne Narrative Non-Fiction Prize.

"... During my residency at Gunyah, I plan to write the final essay for my memoir collection about the environment, climate change and loss, while I am in this beautiful location on Worimi Country. This essay will complete the collection, so I will also do second drafts of those essays not already published in literary journals. ..."

Betty O'Neill, The Other Side of Absence, 2020, book cover


Betty O'Neill is a writer and teacher, living on Gadigal Land, Sydney NSW. She has a Doctorate in Creative Arts from UTS, where she lectures in Creative Intelligence and Innovation. She wrote her doctoral thesis on her quest to understand her father, a World War II Polish resistance fighter who survived Auschwitz and Gusen. Betty has published academically and facilitated workshops in Australia and overseas on creativity, writing family history, the Cold War, migration and the domestic space as an archive. The Other Side of Absence: Discovering my father's secrets, 2020, was her debut memoir.

"... During my residency at Gunyah, I plan to review the first draft and complete a structural edit, of my current memoir project, which explores intergenerational homelessness with my own lived experience and tracing back five generations in my family. ..."



You can follow The Happy Monday's residency at Gunyah on Instagram @gunyahartists

Residency report: Zipper - Celeste Aldahn and Liam Kenny

Celeste Aldahn and Liam Kenny on the Gunyah jetty


"... Upon arriving at Gunyah, we spent a day setting up our studio and getting familiar with our immediate surrounds. It was almost overwhelming thinking about how we might dig into the ten days that followed - it's rare to have the space and time to experiment and create, but time went quickly.

Liam Kenny at Gunyah

In the first week, we finalised guitar and vocal overdubs and mixed two songs for our project Zipper's upcoming double single (out November 2025) and spent some time working on graphic design for upcoming gigs. Knowing there was a storm approaching, we tried to spend some time each day out in Worimi country, finding inspiration from the landscape. 

Celeste Aldahn at Bennet's Beach

We rose at 6am to hit the surf at One Mile and Bennet's, took our afternoon walks through the fire trails, and ended our days sitting by the fire and sketching out demos for new songs as the darkness set in.

Liam Kenny at Gunyah

Our second week saw us hit our stride. We revisited the rough sketches of songs made in week one and worked through refining them, walking away with a total of 8 demos - most of which had bass, drums, guitars, keys and sometimes vocal melodies. We feel mostly all of these demos will go on to form songs for our projects Big Echo and Zipper. We brought a surplus of instruments and recording gear, as we anticipated we might capture some more experimental recordings in our second week - but much of this was unused, as in the end we opted to keep things simple and to move through as much material as possible  while we had the privilege of time and space time and space. 

Celeste Aldahn at Gunyah

We also experimented with new processes, thinking about tactile methods we could use for our upcoming single artwork - testing out cyanotype and polaroid emulsion lifts. As musicians, time and space to explore and experiment is vital to our growth and development. 

Zipper instruments at Gunyah 

With busy lives and multiple bands on the go, carving out space separate to our day-to-day lives in precious and gives us the chance to focus in - think about the future - and feel excited about what's to come. Since returning to Naarm, we've started working on these demos with our band in the lead up to recording them late 2025. ..."

Gunyah residency report, June-July 2025
Zipper - Celeste Aldahn & Liam Kenny


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