Matt Ottley and Tina Wilson recently brought their groundbreaking The Sound of Picture Books presentation and performances to Newcastle. At the general public presentation in Newcastle City Library, the audience were intrigued and captivated by the concept of the music, art and words of a picture book being intrinsically linked in a multi modal performance of sight and sound. Matt demonstrated how the music he composes is derived from the shapes and colours of illustrations and the text in picture books to extrapolate, inform and enhance the experience of ‘reading’ a picture book.

Almost 400 school students attended free performances of Stickboy and The Messy Bath Monster at The University of Newcastle. Students were enthralled by the magic of Matt’s picture book Stickboy and delighted in the humour of Tina’s picture book The Messy Bath Monster, experienced through the multimodal lens employed in The Sound of Picture Books. For all of these performances we were fortunate to have a bassoonist and cellist assisting with the improvisational aspects of Matt’s creation of  music from illustrations as they were being drawn.

The Sound of Picture Books could not have been a more fitting way to celebrate the CBCA’s 2026 theme of A Symphony of Stories and we hope to have Matt and Tina back to showcase the unique and thought provoking experience to even more students in the Hunter Region.