Book Launch- Anna Cahill

Colours of a Life is an accessible and fascinating biography of Douglas MacDiarmid, a talented artist from New Zealand based in Paris since 1952. This book has wide audience appeal. It is not only for art lovers, biography-readers and followers of history and cultural change, but an inspirational story of overcoming the odds for anyone wanting to liberate their potential and follow their dreams.

Anna Cahill is the niece of Douglas MacDiarmid and is a Queenslander writer, living on the Brisbane Bayside. Colours of Life was a personal challenge for her, working across three countries to chronicle the extraordinary career of a remarkable nonagenarian uncle. The book, illustrated with 150 paintings and personal photographs, was published in New Zealand in July 2018. 

This book is supported by a dedicated website for which Anna regularly writes blogs on the stories behind significant paintings and other glimpses into MacDiarmid’s unconventional life. http://www.douglasmacdiarmid.com/

A Stranger Everywhere is a 52-minute documentary about Douglas MacDiarmid and his views on society.

Filmed in 2006, when Douglas was 84 years old, the film explains in a philosophical but simple way how everything in life is interconnected. MacDiarmid describes 10 important issues that surround our existence: beliefs, conflict, communication, progress, respect, ambition, responsibility, tradition, time compression, and work. Within this road to wisdom, we discover his intense and stylish artworks.

French documentary filmmaker Eric Grinda describes MacDiarmid as dynamic, disciplined and active. “Douglas MacDiarmid is a great ambassador not only for New Zealand and France, but above all for human intelligence…Douglas resembles an aristocrat of another time, tall, with a penetrating glance. His fine hands are simply artistic. There is nothing superfluous in the man.”