OK Charlton returns to the Victorian north east town this February, taking over the Charlton Motel for two huge nights of music and activities. This year you’ll hear tunes from The Peep Tempel, The Slingers, Nice Biscuit, Watty Thompson & His Total Fire, Band, The Belair Lip Bombs, Polly and The Pockets, Comets, DJs Queenie and Brat Paisley.
There are a ton of activities happening around Charlton during OK Charlton, including an excellent outdoor exhibition put together by photographer, Em Jensen.
BT: How did the exhibition come about?
Em Jensen: I’ve been a big fan of the concept behind OK Motels for years—encouraging music punters to road-trip to regional towns and as such invest in the regional economy is something I support wholeheartedly!
I also am a big believer in having arts events that are multi-faceted and include multiple art forms; it can be tricky encouraging punters to attend art exhibitions as passionately as they do music festivals, so offering two in one is an easy way for music fans to be able to engage with the visual arts community too!
I reached out to Kate (OK Motels organiser) to discuss potential ideas for how we can add a visual arts element to the festival. We had many ideas for this but in the end it made the most sense to have the photos exhibited outside around town so locals, festival go-ers and road-trippers can have a gander as they wander from one venue to the next.
Tell me about the photographers that you’ve chosen to be a part of it
EJ: The concept for the exhibition was to exhibit only photos made in regional Australia, to hopefully encourage viewers to spend more time regionally!
I chose the line-up of photographers based on photographers I knew of who make photos regionally. I also wanted to include photographers from many different fields of photography, and with vastly different focuses and subject matter in their work; all with their own take on regional Australia. There’s such a mix of photographers on the line-up and yet all the photos compliment each other so well. I can’t believe the talent we have onboard—every photographer involved is a truly iconic Australian photographer in their own right.
Photographers featured include:
- Kristoffer Paulsen | @kristofferpaulsen
- Nathan Kaso | @analog_modern
- Aishah Kent | @aishah_k
- Xander Linger | @xanderlinger
- Kyle Dobie | @kyledobie.co
And more.
Keep up to date with everything happening at OK Charlton on the OK Motels website.
