COOL GIRLS BLEED TOO!!!
Fiona McMillan reading at I Keep Looking Different, 2024
Poetry & Prose by Fiona McMillan
March 26, 2025
6pm
Open to: Everyone!
Free + in-person program
ARTIST STATEMENT
COOL GIRLS BLEED TOO!!! Is a collection of 10 poems written over the past year of my life. I like to think of this reading as the angry, older sister to my first reading, I Keep Looking Different. That body of work will always hold such a special place in my heart, because it holds the poems that helped me see myself as a writer for the first time. I will never not adore those works, but the truth is, they don’t feel like mine anymore. They feel nostalgic, but un-relatable to the current struggles & emotions I face as a twenty-year-old woman.
In this collection, I will be examining multiple themes prevalent in my current life, such as the sacrificial nature of romantic love, and ever-evolving path towards mental stability. These are ideas that I write about often, because they are constant focuses in my brain. However, I hope this collection can serve as a more refined take on these familiar concepts, giving insight into the ways my perspective has evolved with age & experience.
I hope you enjoy these pieces as much as I enjoyed creating them, and thank you so much for your presence & willingness to listen.
FIONA MCMILLAN
Fiona McMillan (b. 2004) is an interdisciplinary artist from Whitby, Ontario currently based in Katarokwi/Kingston. She is pursuing her Bachelor of Fine Arts (Honours) with a minor in Philosophy at Queen’s University.
As an oil painter & prose writer, Fiona enjoys connecting her personal lived experiences to her artwork. Being heard & taken seriously is never an easy task, and as a young, queer woman, communicating opinions becomes a near impossible feat. Fiona uses her work as a way to raise her voice, and give her perspectives the merit they would not be granted outside of an artistic form. Her visual and written work create a barrier between her thoughts and herself, allowing them to be processed without the haze of femininity lowering their validity. She explores themes of sexuality, gender, intimacy, and mental health through the examination of mundane rituals & human relationships.
In her visual practice, Fiona takes a figurative approach to painting, often depicting large scale compositions of the female form, moments of queer intimacy, and snapshots of mundane rituals connected to womanhood. Her written work serves as a vessel to explore similar themes, but from a much more personal standpoint. Her poetry & prose writing track the evolution of herself, focusing on themes such as the extreme nature of mental health, devotion & consumption in romantic intimacy, and the routine frustrations of being a woman with things to say.
Fiona often overlaps themes and motifs in her visual and written work, allowing each to support the other, and creating an intricate world of understanding within her practice.