Don Watson On Trump, Harris, and America on the Brink; A Special Panel Talks About The Photobooth & Melbourne Icon Alan Adler; Mid-Autumn Festival With Linda Jaivin & Joey Leung

Uncommon Sense

Don Watson, acclaimed author and former speechwriter to Paul Keating, speaks in-depth about his Quarterly Essay, High Noon: Trump, Harris and America on the Brink, on the 2024 US Presidential Election and whether the United States of America is disintegrating. He travelled around the country as part of his research for the essay earlier this year.

Amy will also be joined by a special panel with Daniel Boetker-Smith (CCP Director), Catlin Langford (outgoing CCP Curator), Jessie Norman, and Christopher Sutherland, to talk about a brilliant photography prokect and book co-published by Perimeter Editions and the Centre for Contemporary Photography. Auto-Photo: A Life in Portraits tells the story of Alan Adler, a Melbourne man who is likely the the most photographed person in Australia, and is also perhaps the oldest and longest-serving photobooth technician in the world. Alan maintained a suite of photobooths across Melbourne/Naarm for over 50 years – most notably, at Flinders Street Station – and would undertake weekly testing and servicing on each photobooth across his network. Adler would take a seat in the booth and produce a test strip of photographs – these photos from the 1970s to the 2010s – form the basis of the book and a forthcoming exhibition in 2025. In 2018, with the booth at Flinders Street Station facing imminent closure, Christopher Sutherland and Jessie Norman – whose operation later became known as Metro-Auto-Photo – began working with Adler to generate interest in his work and to successfully save his photobooth.

It's Mid-Autumn Festival (also known as Moon Festival) on Tuesday 17th September. Joey Leung, founder of Joy Jaune, an artisan patisserie and dessert shop at the Preston Market, and author and Sinologist Linda Jaivin talk about the significance of Mid-Autumn Festival in China and to many other Asian cultures, including Japan, South Korea, Vietnam, Taiwan, Hong Kong, Thailand, Singapore, Malaysia, and the Philippines. They talk about the story of the Moon Goddess Chang'e, the traditions around mooncakes, family reunion, and more! Joey sells her beautiful mooncakes every Moon Festival – check out her Instagram!