About Peter
Peter Sipeli has more than two decades of expertise in using and managing advocacy through artistic expression. He is an Arts Manager, and supporter of the Spokenword arts movement in Fiji. Peter founded ‘The Poetry Shop, Fiji’ in 2013, a poetry collective that facilitates regular poetry events in Suva and poetry circle discussions with new and emerging Fijian writers. Peter is co-founder of Centre for the Arts - a new community art centre in Suva framed to create space for new emerging art forms and artists. He works as a gay activist using storytelling as advocacy was one of the speakers at the inaugural Tedx Suva. Peter is passionate about developing the literary arts in Fiji and addressing prolonged silences in the art form. A SLAM poet with a large following, he is a champion of the revival of the literary movement in Fiji, working to provide spaces for new and emerging poets and artists to enable the framing of authentic local voices. Peter has published four poetry collections - Blue Man Dreaming (University of the South Pacific Press, 2014), Maps to the Ancestors (Les Petites Alle`es, 2016), Lialiaci (University of the South Pacific, 2018) and Sleeping Ancestors (USP Press, 2020). Peter lives in Suva with his partner Mark Lal and their two cats Friday and Nala.