Audio transcript

Between the bookshelves – 2. Matt Ottley

[intro music]

ANNOUNCER: Listen @ The Arts Unit.

[didgeridoo playing]

JADE ARNOLD: The Arts Unit recognises Aboriginal and Torres Strait Islander peoples as the First Peoples and storytellers of this place, now known as Australia. We are grateful for the continuing care of Country, waterways and skies where we listen, read and learn.

From here on the lands of the Gadigal and Wangal peoples of the Eora nation, and from wherever you are listening, we respect the Elders of the past and present and extend that respect to any Aboriginal and Torres Strait Islander peoples listening.

[theme music - Matt Ottley, 'Dance of the Jellyfish']

You're listening to 'Between the bookshelves'-- the official podcast of the NSW Premier's Reading Challenge. I'm your host, Jade Arnold, the Premier's Program Officer, Reading and Spelling, at the Arts Unit.

Join me as I chat with children's and young adult authors and other experts in education and children's fiction as we talk about the books and the strategies that may spark or reignite a love of reading. Let's dive in.

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Welcome to episode 2 of 'Between the bookshelves'. I'm joined today by the incredibly talented Matt Ottley, who's an artist, illustrator and composer. Matt has more than 40 picture books to his name, and a number of these, including 'Stickboy', 'How to Make a Bird', 'The Incredible Freedom Machines', 'Crusts', 'Suri's Wall' and much more feature on our PRC booklists ranging from the K to 2 to the 7 to 9 booklist.

Matthew also created the artwork for the 2025 Premier's Reading Challenge, titled 'Dance of the Jellyfish', and composed a piece of music by the same name, which you just heard in our podcast introduction.

Matt, thank you so much for joining me today. How are you?

MATT OTTLEY: Thank you, Jade. I'm very well, thank you.

JADE ARNOLD: That's lovely to hear. Now, Matt, you and I have had a massive day today at the Arts Unit in Lewisham. We've just come off the back of recording your composition, which was performed by our Arts Unit ensemble students. And I have so many questions to ask you about the musical process and the interconnection between art and music. But before we get there, I'd like to chat with you about some of your most recent picture books now that the Premier's Reading Challenge is open to students.

Your most recent release is 'Stickboy', which was written by Rebecca Young and illustrated by yourself. And it features on the 5 to 6 booklist. If we were to imagine a student standing between the bookshelves looking for a picture book to read, what would you say to them to convince them to pick up this book?

MATT OTTLEY: Wow, that's a great question.

JADE ARNOLD: And a long one, too.

[laughter]

MATT OTTLEY: I guess, depending on the student, I'd let them know that this was, or is, a fabulous story that, in a very gentle way, is about some really important issues facing the world. But it does it in the way Rebecca Young can do with her writing, does it in a way that is not didactic, doesn't feel you're leaving at all distressed, and basically inspires you to think about what it's about and to think about the possibilities, because she is brilliant at illuminating the potential of human beings to do wonderful things.

And ultimately, that's what this story is about. It's about someone who has the most extraordinary power that's hidden within them. And it's a power that the hero of the story doesn't even realise he's got until he discovers it. And it's a power that can save everyone around him.

JADE ARNOLD: I think that's such a beautiful description. And there's that beautiful relationship between your illustration and Rebecca Young's writing style, where it's layered, and you can take that surface story out of it. But then it really encourages you to reread and stop and think about the images and the connection with the words. And there's so much to take out of that book. And the illustrations are stunning. So, that's a wonderful description. And I hope many students pick that up.

Some of your most widely read books on the PRC booklists are 'Parachute', written by Danny Parker, 'Teacup', written by Rebecca Young and 'Luke's Way of Looking', written by Nadia Wheatley, with a combined 8,000 students adding these books to their reading logs in 2024 alone. Why do you think these books are so popular and still appeal to readers, despite them being published several years ago?

MATT OTTLEY: Well, if I can start with 'Luke's Way of Looking', it's because it is a timeless story about creativity and about finding one's own sense of place in the world. And again, Nadia did what Rebecca does with that text. She did it in such a beautifully gentle way. It's a story about the ludicrousness of judgement and how all of us can shine, given the right kind of understanding of those around us.

There's a scene at the end of the book where Luke's shadow shows that he has wings. He doesn't have wings in himself, but his shadow makes him appear that he has wings. And the wings are actually the shadow of the teacher, who up till that point has been extremely judgmental and negative towards him. But he's finally been able to see that that is not the way to approach this boy. And so, it's a really powerful message about looking deeper, about not judging and about empathy, about compassion.

And I suppose that's what all of those stories are. Certainly, Rebecca's story is about how important it is for each of us to find our place in the world. And it does so in such a lyrical and poetic way, but underneath that, it's a very poignant story about refugees and asylum seekers. A lot of people do actually miss that point, interestingly enough. But that's why it's such a successful book.

And Danny's writing, it's eternal. It is just beautiful and poetic. And it really gets to the heart of what's important to the life of a young child.

You know, so, 'Parachute' is about a young boy who carries a parachute everywhere with him, just in case he's going to need it. And that is such a silly idea in itself, but it's extraordinarily powerful. Well, and it is powerful, but because of its flippancy. Danny is a master of that.

JADE ARNOLD: Mhm, absolutely. I remember 'Luke's Way of Looking' fondly as an English teacher. It was a text that we used to teach visual literacy to high school students. And it was always such a fantastic text to draw them in with the different styles of illustration and how you change from that real line-drawing style with very dark colours, to then juxtapose that with the colour and the imagination and the vibrancy of Luke's illustrations.

And I think the thing that always stood out to me as a teacher is that message of how this book really hammers home this idea to students that often people will think in different ways, and that can often lead to judgement. But if we can celebrate that and nurture that, that's where creativity lives, and that's where all these different beautiful perspectives come from. And that's key to unlocking creativity and growth within ourselves. So, absolutely fantastic book for teaching visual literacy to high school students. But I think there's a lot of potential in all those books that we've just spoken about to explore those types of ideas.

You have written so many books that it's just not possible for us to talk about each and every one of them on a single podcast. But can I ask you, which book, or if you can't pick one, a few books that you really enjoyed working on the most, or which book is the most special to you?

MATT OTTLEY: Well, they're all special. I've been in the privileged position of being able to choose very carefully the books that I've illustrated. And so, I've only ever chosen works that really speak to me. But if I had to select some, I suppose the first would be a book called 'Mrs Millie's Painting', which is one of my own texts.

But it's about an elderly lady who has an adventure in the top of a tree. And really, it came from my own childhood. I was brought up in the Highlands of Papua New Guinea. And I used to build cubby houses up in the rainforest canopy. And there were a couple of stands of trees in which the canopy and the layers of creepers over them were so thick you could almost wade across the top. And that's where that idea came from. So, that's very special to me.

Rebecca's books, 'Teacup' and 'Stickboy', are among 2 of my favourites. And that is because Rebecca's-- the light in her work, in her words allows me to explore darkness in the illustrations in a way that just gives extraordinary dimension and depth to her work, I think.

Similarly, 'How to Make a Bird', Meg McKinlay's text, is one of my favourites. That, to me, is an example of a perfect picture book text. It speaks to so many different age groups. It speaks to young kids who have no idea what it's about. And it was an opportunity for me to explore a state of meditation, because that's what it is. It's a meditation on letting go and on creativity.

I suppose 2 of the books that come from really deep within me are 'Requiem for a Beast', which is a work for young adults, because that's based on some of my own experiences working as a stockman on cattle stations when I was a teenager and a young adult, and most recently, 'Tree of Ecstasy and Unbearable Sadness', because that is about my own journey through mental illness. So, that book particularly is the most profound statement that I have yet made to the world, I think, partly as well because I was given the opportunity to explore a very large musical work, writing a very large musical work to go with it. So, yeah, if I had to choose, they would be the books that resonate most deeply with me.

JADE ARNOLD: Yeah, absolutely. I would say, probably 'book' is not the best way to explain those 2 works. They're more experiences, because there's, for both of them, an orchestral piece of music that accompanies both of them that really enhances the reading experience. So, it's not just a single mode of experiencing those texts.

Now, I think you touched a little bit on your answer to this in the start of that last question, but what I'd like to ask is, how do you work with the author to bring these stories to life? Are you given the story and given creative freedom? Does the author provide you with some guidance, or is that process different depending on which author you're working with? And I'm assuming you're able to be a little bit picky with who you're working with.

MATT OTTLEY: Yeah, well, it does depend largely on the author. It also depends on the publisher. And every experience has been different. I should say up front, most publishers don't like authors and illustrators talking with each other.

JADE ARNOLD: Right, OK. That's really interesting.

MATT OTTLEY: They prefer the editor to be the conduit for any kind of discussion. But that just flat out doesn't work for me. So, the only author that I haven't had a close collaboration with during the working process was John Marsden in 'Home and Away'. And that's probably largely because of-- this is going to sound-- it's not meant to sound terrible in terms of the other authors, but John had such trust in my work.

He basically said, 'No, I will be happy with whatever you do, and I don't want to interfere.' So, I was left to do whatever I wanted to do. Now that, in terms of that text, was-- I don't want to say it was a relatively easy job, but it wasn't difficult, because there were so many ways that I could approach that text.

But usually what happens, and certainly this is what has happened with Danny Parker, because Danny and I are really good friends, we totally ignored the publisher and had plenty of cups of tea and chats over the work. And we really workshopped my illustration ideas, which then influenced changes that he would make in the text. And we'd get everything ironed out. Then he would take the text back to the editor and say, 'Look, this is my latest thinking. Could you just tell Matt about this?'

And so, the editor would duly contact me and say, 'What do you think?' And I'd go, 'Oh, I love that. Yeah, no, this is going to be great to work with.' And so, we kind of controlled the process.

JADE ARNOLD: Very under the table, though.

MATT OTTLEY: Very under the table, right? And there was just a brilliant working collaboration-- or collaborations, they were. With Kirli Saunders, it was kind of similar. She didn't change her text much, but we certainly talked a lot about what the book was going to be about visually.

I had plenty of chats with Meg McKinlay. The text, I didn't feel that anything from an illustrator's perspective needed to be changed with the text. It's a beautiful piece of poetry. So, it was more about me asking her about the philosophical background to the text, the influences of Japanese culture in it, and then how I reflected on that and how I could make some of those ideas my own.

So, we had plenty of discussions about that. And that's the way I prefer to work. I prefer to work closely with an author.

Having said that, I'm not working with authors anymore apart from my partner Tina, because we're a creative team. So, we have books planned together. But certainly, outside collaborations are a thing of the past for me now. I'm very proud of all the books I've done. But it's really going to be mine and our own work from here on in.

JADE ARNOLD: That's really exciting. Are you able to give us any sneak peeks about what is coming up? Or is that all very under wraps for now?

MATT OTTLEY: No, not necessarily. I mean, not under wraps. It's mostly focusing on this initiative that I started about 10 years ago, called The Sound of Picture Books. So, one of the new books coming up that we will be performing later this year is the second book in Tina's 'Monkey's Great Adventures' series, in which she takes knitted characters that her mum makes.

We either travel the world or domestically here in Australia, and Tina sets Monkey up in all of these situations and photographs him and creates these stories around the photographs. And then I write music. And so, we'll be performing the new Monkey book, which hasn't been published yet. But it's called 'The Messy Bath Monster'.

JADE ARNOLD: That's really exciting to hear. Thank you for sharing the title with us.

MATT OTTLEY: That's OK. We will also be performing 'Stickboy' this year as well. But I've got 3 new picture books, which we will either publish ourselves or I will publish via an international publisher, largely probably for an international market. And they're sort of in very early development stage, so, I probably won't talk about those at this stage.

JADE ARNOLD: Still, it's very exciting to hear that there's still plenty of creative things to come out of your brain, which is going to be really exciting to look forward to. There are often a lot of reoccurring or interrelated themes in a lot of your works, which, as an educator, makes them so incredibly rich to dive into and explore with students. In 'Stickboy', we follow an outcast who's been shunned by society.

'Incredible Freedom Machines', we have a girl seeking freedom and imagination in a world constricted by boundaries. And in 'Sarah and the Steep Slope', Sarah is confronted by a slope outside of her house that could represent anxiety, fear or depression.

Has this been a conscious decision, either on your behalf or on the authors who seek you out as an illustrator?

MATT OTTLEY: Great question. It's a little bit of both, and in some cases accidental. So, in 'Home and Away', I was given that text by my editor, who said, 'Would you like to illustrate this?' And as soon as I read it, it hit me in the solar plexus. And I have to admit, I was not really engaged with the refugee and asylum seeker issue much. But it turned that whole-- it sounds like an odd thing to say-- but turned that whole world on for me. And I became very much an advocate and very involved in asylum seeker support networks.

And of course, that placed me in the right position to fall in love with Rebecca Young's 'Teacup' story, because it was about an issue I had grown to become very passionate about. For Danny's books, he showed me a few different texts. And I said, 'Yep, I'd love to work on that one,' 'Parachute' being one. And again, that was because-- I guess not necessarily because of the themes the book's about, because he writes on a lot of different themes, but the way in which he expressed those themes, in such a gentle and almost whimsical and, at times, poignant way.

For a book like 'The Incredible Freedom Machines', the themes in that book kind of came about accidentally, because Kirli, who has become a really good mate of Tina's and mine, originally wrote that text as like a love poem to her motorcycle, because it was the thing at a certain time in her life that gave her a sense of freedom and escape and she could blow air through her lungs and see lots of country. And it was thinking time for her.

But because I have the condition of synaesthesia, motorcycles don't sit easily in my consciousness, because it's generally a particular sound that can actually be quite painful. So, I said to Kirli, 'I really don't want to do a book about motorcycles.' And she said, 'Well, whatever you do it about, can you at least have, if you create a freedom machine, have red on it somewhere?' because her Ducati was red. So, I said, 'OK, fine.'

I was listening to a song by the Moody Blues that has come from the '70s, I think, called 'Thinking is the Best Way to Travel'. And as I was listening to it, I had the idea, 'No, actually, I think reading is the best way to travel because it can take you absolutely anywhere.' And then it just dropped into my head, that is what the 'Freedom Machines' is going to be about. It's going to be about literature, about reading. A book is the ultimate freedom machine.

So, that led to me creating the environment in which the girl lived, because I thought-- I've heard so many inspiring stories about literature, about culture, about music, giving children from slums-- so, I've just recently read about a symphony orchestra in Venezuela that takes children from areas where they're vulnerable to the drug cartels and lives of petty crime, and teaches them how to play musical instruments.

And they all play in this orchestra. But what they've found is-- and it's spread, so, I think that it's touched the lives of well over 30,000 children there now. And the levels of drug and alcohol use have all dropped within those particular families, a really powerful indication of the power of culture.

But I think, particularly, if we're talking about literature, particularly about literature. So, it was important for me that the girl was in a place that is obviously not economically affluent, and whether she ever leaves the place-- she might love it there, doesn't want to leave, but literature will give her the freedom to think her way into wherever she wants to be in the world.

JADE ARNOLD: You've touched on so many things that will resonate with teacher librarians and just lovers of literature there, talking about how reading can often be a pathway to developing empathy, where you're talking about how the power of a story is what opened your eyes to the refugee crisis and the plight of that. And I personally remember a book called 'Because of You', by Pip Harry, which is about homelessness. And I can identify that as being a turning point in my perception of homelessness and how I interacted with people who are experiencing homelessness.

And absolutely, such a fundamental part of being human is just that ability to empathise through story, but then, also, to have narrative as a form of escape and freedom, but, also, a pathway to something brighter and better than we could have imagined without access to that. So, very, very resonant with myself and with teacher librarians. So, thank you for sharing that.

You have a lot of diversity in your artistic style. Your style varies from high realism to surrealism to your trademark twig-limbed characters and sketch-style drawings. How do you decide what kind of look and feel a book is going to have?

MATT OTTLEY: It's entirely what intuitively I feel the story needs.

JADE ARNOLD: It's that artistic brain ticking into overdrive?

MATT OTTLEY: Yeah, just sort of working intuitively. So, you've probably noticed that I often combined that sort of very cartoony twig-limbed, which I love that expression, character look with either a very painterly or sometimes realistic background style.

So, I do combine styles as well. And again, it's entirely what the story needs. A story like 'Sarah and the Steep Slope' is-- the backgrounds are relatively stylised and cartoony as well as the characters. But that's because I just felt that was the best way to present the idea of the slope in the story without it being threatening, but at the same time letting us know that it is something huge in this little girl's life.

JADE ARNOLD: Yeah, there's a lot of colour and patterns in that slope that make it very fun to look at. And obviously, when you've got younger readers experiencing that, you don't want them to feel overwhelmed or threatened by those images. But there's still very much that sense of isolation caused by that slope. And I think that artistic style carries that really well.

So, I recently learned that you're red-green colourblind, and you also mentioned that you have synaesthesia. How does that influence your art?

MATT OTTLEY: Well, the red-green colour blindness kind of doesn't, except that I do have to have work checked before I send it off. I did send a painting of Mrs Millie off while that book was being produced, and apparently, she had green skin.

JADE ARNOLD: [laughs]

MATT OTTLEY: So, I do make mistakes. But I think it's also kind of given me a freedom as well, in that if it looks right, it must be OK. And it's my sense of aesthetic against sort of everyone else's when they're telling me it's wrong. And obviously, the colour of a person's skin, from whatever part of the world they are, has to be recognisable as their skin colour, otherwise it probably looks a bit surreal.

But when it comes to landscapes and the colours of other objects and images, it can often probably illuminate thematic material or moods that other people pick up on that, had the work been constrained by a very natural, realistic colour scheme, it just might not have happened. And one of my creative artistic heroes is Ludwig van Beethoven. And just about everything that we know of his that is very popular, he wrote while he was stone deaf. So, if he can do that without being able to hear, then I can throw colour around without being able to see a very small part of that spectrum.

JADE ARNOLD: That's so interesting. And as you were talking about that story, I just feel like Luke's way of looking, coming back into that, and there's a level of-- well, at least maybe I'm pushing that there, but I feel like there's a level of you in the character of Luke, who just has a very particular way of seeing things. And that leads to a very different sense of art. But there's so much beauty in that. So, that's so interesting.

We've kind of touched on this a little earlier as well, but there's often an assumption that picture books are solely for younger readers. But you have a number of books that are on the 5 to 6 and 7 to 9 booklists, as well as books that are aimed at adults and young adults. What do you think makes your books, and picture books in general, so appealing to older readers or just that art form in general?

MATT OTTLEY: Well, I suppose it's because both in visual arts and in music, I don't believe in playing down to children. I think children are able to appreciate sophisticated levels of artistic expression, whether it's words, images or music. And they will read into it what they can and what they want to. But I also do think that picture books are still, and I think for a long time will be, an untapped literary art form that has enormous potential.

But we are sort of still stuck in a cultural mindset that picture books are for children, that comic books are for people who don't know how to read well. And as a consequence, the kind of multi-layered sophistication of plot and expression of thematic material that you get in a novel can be expressed in its own unique way in a picture book and could be a really sophisticated form of literature for adults. But it's just not within the culture, not yet. And you do see it in other parts of the world. But I think it's going to be a long time coming to Australia.

JADE ARNOLD: Well, I'm glad that we have your books as a starting point at the very least, and hopefully that continues to change over time. I imagine that there are a number of your books that stand out to young readers and will likely be stories that stay with them for years to come. Are there any books from your own childhood that stand out to you?

MATT OTTLEY: Yeah, there are, although picture books were not particularly sophisticated when I was a child. But I do remember there was a book called 'Go Dogs Go' about a whole bunch of dogs that have a party in the top of a tree. Again, probably because I was passionate about climbing trees when I was a little kid. But I did love Dr Seuss. I think Dr Seuss is a perennial, is going to be, within culture of literature for children, the world over, probably, for a very, very long time.

There was a book called 'Nellie Come Home'. And it was about a steam train that travels the world. But it was the kind of twisting plot that people did express in picture books, because picture books were often very wordy in those days. And I suspect that fashion and form will cycle back again. Picture books tend to be very spare at the moment.

But yeah, I think-- this is going to sound awfully self-centred in some strange way, but it was kind of my own work, because we lived in a place in the Highlands of New Guinea where we didn't get a lot of books. And in the later years, I was-- in New Guinea, ironically, it was the book clubs through Scholastic that found their way up into the Highlands of New Guinea. But of course, the turnaround was months. You'd look at the form and tick the box of which book you want, and then you'd just be waiting forever.

JADE ARNOLD: And almost forget about it before it came.

MATT OTTLEY: Yeah, but my mum used to get all sorts of recycled paper and sew it together into little booklets and then stick bits of cardboard on the covers and make these little drawing books for me. And I used to write and illustrate stories for the rest of the family. And I think that is where my passion for storytelling, and particularly for picture books, came from.

JADE ARNOLD: I love that even despite not having a lot of access to picture books, you still made them a part of your own life through sheer force of will.

MATT OTTLEY: Yeah.

JADE ARNOLD: Now, you have another lovely little connection with NSW Department of Education beyond illustrating the PRC artwork. You've also illustrated a phenomenal number of illustrations for 'The School Magazine'.

So, for our listeners who aren't aware, 'The School Magazine' is both the oldest magazine in Australia and the longest-running literary publication for children in Australia, having been established by the Department of Education in 1916.

The lovely School Magazine team very kindly had a look through their archives for me. And to date, you have illustrated at least a whopping 223 pieces of art, with your work going back as far as 2004.

Can you tell us a little about your time illustrating for 'The School Magazine', and what drew you to it, and how it differs from illustrating picture books?

MATT OTTLEY: Yeah, it was through the late Kim Gamble, wonderful illustrator, who was a friend. And it was either late 2003 or early 2004 that he came to me and said, 'Would you be interested, if I recommend your name to them?' You had to go through an application process, you know, they were good about that. But you know-- 'So, next time those applications are open, why don't you submit some stuff?' Partly because I think he wanted to pull back. He was working for them, but he was sort of trying to ease himself out of his own workload.

And it just became the most wonderful experience for me. Every time a new job would arrive, it was a bit like a-- kind of a lucky dip, 'cause that they had me doing mostly poetry. And it was just really exciting to open up the email and read the poem and go, 'OK, what can I do for this?' So, I had no idea from month to month what the work was going to be. But it was a lot of fun. And they were a fabulous team to work for.

JADE ARNOLD: Well, they spoke very highly of you and with great fondness. So, hopefully, for anyone listening, especially in a primary school setting, you might be able to access some of those older issues and see your wonderful work.

The next part of what I'm going to talk to you about is a little hard to do via podcast, because I'm going to be asking you some questions specifically surrounding the PRC artwork. So, if you're listening to this podcast and you haven't seen the 2025 PRC artwork already, please do yourself a massive favour and head over to premiersreadingchallenge.nsw.edu.au to see it.

I'm going to do my best to do its visuals justice, but you know what they say, 'A picture is worth a thousand words,' and I don't have the time to sit here and use a thousand words. So, it is this beautiful, whimsical, surrealist image that features a young girl sitting on a flying book while reading. There's this swarm of butterflies behind her, intermingled with her hair. There's also a mix of realistic and whimsical creatures flying through the clouds with her, including book jellyfish and book stingrays, which are my favourite.

Can you take us through your creative process for the PRC artwork? What was it like creating this artwork to promote reading when there's no narrative for it?

MATT OTTLEY: Well, the first thing I did, because it's how I work best, was to create a narrative. So, I asked myself a lot of questions about what was the story I wanted to tell. And I decided, because I guess it's a theme that has, as you've already alluded to, pops up a lot in my work, I wanted to illustrate something about connection, about belonging, about community, about working together.

Now, it might be hard to see all those themes initially, but if you look at all the elements. So, I wanted also to have a sort of a magical feel to it and to, I guess, tip lots of things upside down. So, if you look at the stingray creatures, which are books that are stingrays, a stingray is something that sort of has the motion of flying. It sort of flaps its wings, and it flies through the water. But, of course, this is a stingray that's in the sky.

Then, well, if you look at the girl, she's sitting on a book. But she's also reading a book, so, the entity that she's reading is also the thing that's carrying her. And if you look closely, the butterflies actually are her hair that morphs into butterflies. So, that's about change and about growth and about growing through a process that becomes something quite beautiful. Because I've always been interested in the idea that a caterpillar inside a chrysalis goes through this sort of period of struggle. And it looks like struggle.

And they emerge, and they're all crumpled up, and then they unfold. And that is the process of learning. That is the process of growing your imagination and your thinking and the power that is housed within you. So, that's what the butterflies are about.

There's a whale that is sort of in a haze in the distance. And that's just a thing of size and of awesome beauty. But it's also a mammal. And we are mammals. And so, across this vastness, there is a connection. And that's sort of symbolic of a connection to all things.

The jellyfish-- again, they are books that are jellyfish. If you think about it, jellyfish, they're not a single entity. They are a lot of different creatures that come together in this symbiotic relationship that allows the whole to exist in the world and to move through the water and to work as one, and yet they are all separate entities. So, they, to me, are the perfect symbol, metaphor for unity, for working together in this kind of perfect relationship. So, there was lots of thought that went into all of the elements.

JADE ARNOLD: That's wonderful. Now, this is, again, a hard thing to segue into because we're in a podcast. But Matt is actually sitting in front of me with an amazing jellyfish shirt on, which has got a black background with blue, with tinges of green jellyfish swimming around. So, clearly jellyfish are something that draw or resonate with you.

And I remember seeing some very similar sea creatures flying through in the illustrations in 'Stickboy'. So, there's that clear theme throughout your work and that connection with everything artistic that you touch that just has this very distinct Matt Ottley signature to it. So, it's lovely to see that connection. And I hope that little explanation was something that our teacher librarians listening can help unpack with their students and help them, I guess, enjoy the deeper meaning of this artwork. So, thank you so much for that.

You've also very generously composed a piece of music titled 'Dance of the Jellyfish', that accompanies this beautiful work. Can you tell us a little about the process of composing music that ties in with an illustration? Does the art come first? Or does it kind of all happen at once?

MATT OTTLEY: Sometimes it happens at once. But other times-- well, it can go either way. Often, I do a piece of artwork, and then I'll take lines from the images in the artwork and lay them on a music stave to create melodic lines. And obviously I have to adjust certain pitches to make the music work. And I will take other parts of the same object or other objects in the image to similarly create the vertical part of music, the harmonic structure.

And then that leads me on to thinking about the thing I've illustrated that I'm writing music about. So, in this case, jellyfish, so, I thought about the way that jellyfish move and that really kind of hypnotic, pulsing thing they do when they're going through the water. So, I wanted to recreate that musically. So, I just came up with a very simple theme that sort of pulses throughout the whole work.

There's a middle section, which is a little bit strident. It's different to the 2 sections that surround it. But again, it is based on the quick, jerky movements that sometimes you see jellyfish do. So, both originally actually came from improvisations I did, doing a live Instagram demonstration of how I work with music for the Literature Centre in Perth.

So, I was just sitting at a piano and had my guitar as well. And I just got thrown images at me. And one of them was a jellyfish out of 'The Incredible Freedom Machines'. And so, I thought on the spot, 'OK, well, it's that pulsing motion. What can I do?' So, the theme came out. And so, later on I thought, 'Oh, that's perfect, I'm going to use that in this piece of music.'

Similarly, the middle section was actually music that I improvised on that same session about bugs, but I kind of made it a little less-- the word is 'legato', so, a little less smooth. And you know when you sometimes see-- well, not so much in jellyfish, but often in smaller, like krill, you'll suddenly see a quick, jerky movement. And they move through space.

And so, yeah, it was kind of that idea that I wanted to recreate. So, often it'll be the image and the shapes and lines, and the colours as well, that inspire particular harmonies, particular melodic shapes, particular tone colours in the music. But then the subject matter itself takes over. And so, yeah, it's a very fluid process.

JADE ARNOLD: That's so interesting. Something really special about this project is that this composition ended up being a collaboration between yourself, the Premier's Reading Challenge and the Arts Unit music ensemble students. What was it like working with these students and having them perform your music?

MATT OTTLEY: Oh, it was extraordinary. A composer can never take for granted other people playing their music. And to have young people that presumably, for some of them, are right in the nascent stages of their careers as musicians play your music, it's quite wonderful, because there's a sort of a freshness to it there.

And the music team, Steve, particularly, the director, he was extraordinary, the way he worked with these young people. It was just wonderful for me to sit there and just watch this whole thing unfold. So, no, I feel very privileged.

JADE ARNOLD: It was a very special moment. I think our viola player and our cello player were both Year 10 students, which is just phenomenal. I try and think back to what I was doing in Year 10, and it certainly wasn't anything that phenomenal. So, yeah, just incredible talent, to just see your composition come to life with some very talented student musicians.

Composing music that links to artwork isn't a new concept for you. We've touched on this a little bit before, but you created this initiative called The Sound of Picture Books around this whole connection between artworks and music. Can you tell us a bit about this initiative and what a performance looks like?

MATT OTTLEY: Yeah, thank you. Well, it started about-- well, I suppose about 14 years ago now, in Perth. It was actually the West Australian Symphony Orchestra approached the Literature Centre, and I just happened to be in residence at the time, saying that they wanted to work with them to perhaps commission composers to write music around this new Australian literature for children and young adults. And the person who was the publicity person at the Literature Centre at the time said, 'Well, we just happen to have someone in residence who is a musician as well as an author and illustrator. Why don't you talk with them?'

And anyway, thankfully the orchestra was open enough to entertain this crazy idea I had, which was not just simply to write music, but to also demonstrate the process of drawing and of creating music on stage. So, it becomes a sort of an immersive experience for the audience. They get to see a piece of music. And the pieces of music all vary.

So, the shortest, which was for Danny Parker's book 'Tree' that I illustrated, that's between 6 and 7 minutes, depending on the performance. The longest I've done is a very large orchestral piece for 'The Tree of Ecstasy and Unbearable Sadness'. It's a 50-minute choral symphony. So, each show is necessarily different.

But for the shows where the works are shorter, we do a performance of the piece of music. So, it might be, for example, a string quintet with a piano. So, that's 6 musicians on stage. And behind them is a screen in which I've made a movie that has smaller bits of animation, but it's animated in that the camera moves around the images. But there are actually small episodes of animation as well, movement animation.

It all syncs with the music. So, the musicians, they're either conducted, or they have earbuds in with a click track. And so, they're playing to the music. And then I will do all sorts of drawing exercises. So, one of them is I just start drawing lines on the whiteboard, and the musicians are instructed to follow me.

And sometimes I'll draw with 2 hands. So, one hand is going up and one's going down, and different parts of the ensemble are following my hands. And it gets pretty wild. I get kids to come up. And they ostensibly, through drawings, start conducting the musicians.

And you see them just getting right into it. And they'll just go mad and scribble. And these musicians are trying to follow this. And it's a lot of fun.

Then I might do something like ask someone to come up on stage, and I'll draw their portrait. And then I'll take the lines of their face and put them on music staves, which are on a second whiteboard, and create music. And then I'll direct the ensemble to sight read and play the music. And I'll start verbally then directing them to do particular things, and others then, who are comfortable, to start really improvising.

And so, this piece of music grows that all began as a drawing. And so, we go through lots of that stuff like that. I sometimes paint as well and talk about the relationship in my painting between sound and painting. And then we do a sort of a reprise, a recap of the original composed piece of music, but the audience is now listening out for all of the elements in which I've been talking about, how I've used images from the book to create the music, et cetera.

So, yeah, it's lots of fun. It's a different way of introducing children to music, and particularly to art music in a way that they wouldn't otherwise have the opportunity to do, I think, because it is all about tying all of the creative processes together. And it's making music play as well.

JADE ARNOLD: It sounds like such an exciting experience and also such an eye-opening one, and so very educational, but probably in a way that students don't realise they're learning because they're too busy having fun. Wow, I love that initiative so much. It sounds phenomenal.

Something that really stood out to me on your description of The Sound of Picture Books on your website is your description of it as an intermodal performance rather than a multimodal experience. What's the importance between this description and distinguishing between those 2 words?

MATT OTTLEY: Well, intermodal is a term I've coined. And it's borrowed from the world of transport. And I know that sounds very platitudinous almost or something, but when you've got goods that need to go from wherever they're produced to somewhere else, they might go on a truck, then on a ship, then on a train, whatever. They go via different modes of transport. So, the product is delivered to the customer via this intermodal system of transport.

And I thought, 'Well, that's a perfect sort of analogy, metaphor, simile for this idea of mine to deliver an idea, a concept, a theme, a story idea, a way of thinking through different modes of creativity.' I call it intermodal, though, because each form of creativity, as I've explained with taking lines and colours and placing those on musical staves and creating the notes, so, each form of creativity-- or doing that process in reverse-- really informs the other. So, then, it's not like I've just taken a piece of music that has the appropriate mood and set it to those images. The actual creation of each is deeply intertwined, so, that's why I call it intermodal.

Also, it's about the way the message is delivered. So, for example, in 'The Tree of Ecstasy and Unbearable Sadness', there's one part in the story-- because that is a book that I want to take people, my audience, in a very safe way, through an experience of psychosis. There's one section where the picture, the image, the illustration talks about-- shows that this metaphorical tree that's growing inside the boy that has flowers of ecstasy but fruit of unbearable sadness, it started to grow without and is encasing him.

So, you can see that he's being trapped. He's being held by his illness. But I wanted also to express the horror of what's going on inside of his head. That could only happen through music. And the words, all the words say is that eventually the illness was too strong for the medicine, so, then the image just shows us how constraining this illness is and how powerful it is in terms of rendering the medication ineffective.

But then the music, which in that part is a 68-part fugue, so, it's this multiple kind of-- there's lots of noise going on in the orchestra, and there's nothing you can follow, and it's just bedlam. And it just becomes oppressive, the sound. So, all those 3 things together carry the theme, carry the idea, carry the sensation of what it is I'm trying to deliver to my audience. So, that's also why I call it intermodal. It's the full experience of each that can bring other qualities to the experience that each form on its own can't, if that makes sense.

JADE ARNOLD: Well, I think you've just answered the next question that I had for you, which was, basically, for 'The Tree of Ecstasy and Unbearable Sadness', which for those of you who aren't aware, it's a longer-form picture book targeted at young adults and adults. Your blurb suggests readers 15 and up.

As you mentioned, you illustrated this 50-minute piece of music for a large orchestra and choir. And it's this incredibly unique experience. So, I was going to ask you why you chose to produce it in this way. But I think you've touched on a lot of that. But can you tell us a little bit more about that project and the inspiration behind it? Because I know it has a very personal side to it.

MATT OTTLEY: Yeah, well, I've lived with type 1 bipolar disorder since I was a child. Basically, I had the first sort of classic bipolar episodes emerge as an adolescent, which is generally when it does emerge. But I had the seeds of psychosis long before that, only realised much, much, much, much later, that's what was actually happening. But like a lot of people who suffer from complex mental illnesses, I have experienced the stigma that goes with it, that is unfortunately still here. It's just-- it sort of finds its way into the way we behave to each other in often obtuse ways.

So, you know, I don't want to go into depth on it. But, for example, one of the really horrible forms of stigma that can occur now is corporate indifference to mental illness. But it's also the impact of an illness like that has effects that people often don't think about. So, for example, it's been a very long time since I've been able to do the kind of usual author-illustrator talks in schools, partly because travelling messes with my body clock.

There are various kinds of stimulation that happens when you're on a tour like that. It's a recipe for ill health for me. But certainly, in Australia, that is practically the only way that authors and illustrators can make money. So, I've been a very highly accoladed author and illustrator, but it has also been an extremely difficult financial road, because I can't do what other authors and illustrators can do.

So, I got to the point where I thought, if I'm truly honest with myself about wanting society to change its deeply held views about complex mental illness, i.e. that people who suffer from illnesses like schizophrenia or psychotic bipolar disorder are not trustworthy, can never have positions of leadership, or in cases, people still think that are often sub-intelligent. Those sort of attitudes still do exist. It's going to have to be up to people like me who can express in a way that others receive my experiences to try and change that narrative.

That really was my sole purpose of doing the project, was just to give people a safe, felt experience of what it might be like. What they do with it after that is their business. But at least I've said my piece.

JADE ARNOLD: Absolutely, I think books, as we were talking about earlier, are this really powerful tool to help develop empathy and understanding in others. And I think, as a society, we've come a long way-- we're not there yet, but a long way in terms of how we talk about depression and anxiety. And there's a lot more representation of characters in fiction and in other forms of media that have those conditions.

But you're right, I certainly can't think of any positive or at least neutral representations of individuals with bipolar or schizophrenia that aren't then portrayed as a villain character in that piece of media. So, it's so important to have representation like that in our literature that we consume. So, it's a very profound piece of work and I strongly recommend the teacher librarians listening to this podcast to pick it up and read it.

Thank you so much for joining me today, Matt. It's been wonderful talking to you about the inspiration and the process behind your artworks and a career that has focused on bringing stories to life. I know our teacher librarians and PRC coordinators will be featuring your books on displays and showcasing both the music and the artwork of 'Dance of the Jellyfish' as they encourage students to dive into reading and hopefully diving into your adult books themselves.

MATT OTTLEY: Thank you, Jade. It's been an absolute pleasure. Thank you.

JADE ARNOLD: Thank you.

[theme music - Matt Ottley, 'Dance of the Jellyfish']

JADE ARNOLD: Thanks for tuning in to 'Between the bookshelves'.

This podcast is produced by the Arts Unit of the NSW Department of Education as part of the 'Listen @ The Arts Unit' series. For more information about our programs, to access our show notes, or to listen to other podcasts, explore our website at artsunit.nsw.edu.au.

For more information about the NSW Premier's Reading Challenge, including our booklists, visit premiersreadingchallenge.nsw.edu.au.

Theme music, 'Dance of the Jellyfish', composed by Matt Ottley. Copyright, Matt Ottley, 2024. Reproduced and communicated with permission.

Background music licensed by Envato Elements.

Copyright, State of NSW (Department of Education), 2025.