Welcome to our feature – Arts Scene Around Freo – compiled by our Arts Editor, Gayle O’Leary. Here we will bring to your attention community Arts events happening around Freo – visual arts, live performances, music gigs of various sorts, you name it. Each week we will post Arts Scene on our homepage as well as in The Weekly Edition. If you’d like to have your event included, let Gayle know!
So, what’s happening this week?
Between Suns
Friday 7 August – 20 September
Open: Wed 1pm-7pm Thu-Sun: 11am – 5pm
Vessel Contemporary is proud to announce ‘Between Suns’, a major survey exhibition of work by Khaled Sabsabi, opening 7 August 2026 at the Naval Store in Fremantle.
Curated by Mikala Tai, the exhibition brings together works spanning 1998 to 2026, including new and previously unexhibited works, transforming Vessel into an immersive, multi-sensory experience.
Working across painting, video, sound, installation and performance, Khaled approaches art as a communicative and ethical space: a shared language through which complex ideas of belonging, faith, power and collectively can be encountered. His work frequently draws on mysticism, ritual and everyday gestures, unfolding across cycles rather than fixed narratives, and inviting audiences into moments of reflection, resonance and exchange.
Sabsabi describes the exhibition as ‘an opportunity to further personal artistic and creative expressions of the undefined routines and the ability to distill space, time and symbolism into the narrative of life.’
‘Between Suns’ runs concurrently with Sabsabi’s representation of Australia at the 2026 Venice Biennale, offering Western Australian audiences a rare opportunity to engage deeply with an internationally acclaimed artist’s practice on a local scale.
Naval Store, 141 Queen Victoria Street, Fremantle
https://vesselcontemporary.org/
10 Nights in Port
Thursday 20 – 30 August 2026
Ten nights, one port city
10 Nights in Port | Walyalup Fremantle Festival
is an annual celebration of arts, music,
performance and community.
For ten nights, the port city hosts a vibrant program of events and entertainment for all ages.
Known by several names throughout its long history, 10 Nights in Port is widely recognised as one of Australia’s oldest recorded festivals, reflecting the evolving story of Fremantle and its people.
Fremantle will come alive with ten nights of music, performance, exhibitions, film, circus, dance, workshops and community gatherings.
P.S. photo above taken by yours truly during last year’s 10 Nights in Port, featuring Freak Out. And I am very excited to see what’s in store for this year!
https://10nightsinport.com.au/gallery/
Mohammed Massoud Morsi – Book Launch and Conversation with Sisonke Msimang
Thursday 27 August 6:30 – 8:30pm
Join us at Fremantle Library to celebrate the launch of two books by Mohammed Massoud Morsi through UWA Publishing: The Hair of the Pigeon and The Palace of Angels.
For this event, we will hear a conversation between the author and Sisonke Msimang.
Mohammed Massoud Morsi is an Egyptian-Danish-Australian photographer, journalist and writer. His work has been published in all three of his traditional languages. Morsi discovered journalism made people yesterday’s news and turned to writing novels instead. He has a talent for reaching to the heart of existence in a complex world and looks to important questions, finding that which is quintessentially human within much broader struggles. His work is enriched by his photographer’s eye for detail and a passion for speaking out for those suppressed, challenging and breaking common narratives all at once.
Sisonke Msimang is the author of Always Another Country: A memoir of exile and home and The Resurrection of Winnie Mandela: A biography of survival. She is a South African writer whose work is focused on race, gender and democracy. She has written for a range of international publications including The New York Times, The Washington Post, The Guardian, Newsweek and Al Jazeera. She now lives in Perth, Australia, where she is head of oral storytelling at the Centre for Stories.
Copies of the books will be available for purchase, and light refreshments provided.
Fremantle Library 151 High Street, Fremantle
Across the Way
Friday 28 August – 14 September 10am – 4pm
Artitja Fine Art Gallery is proud to present ACROSS THE WAY – an exhibition spanning thousands of kilometres and bringing together art from five remote Aboriginal-owned art centres throughout the Pilbara, Kimberley, Western Desert and Ngaanyatjarra Lands
United by a deep connection to Country and distinguished by diverse artistic traditions, the exhibition offers a remarkable journey through some of Australia’s most spectacular landscapes Through colour, pattern and form, the artists share unique perspectives on place, expressing cultural knowledge, lived experience and enduring connections to land.
From the north west to the vast desert regions of the state’s interior, these works reveal the richness and diversity of contemporary First Nations art practice while celebrating the many ways country is known, experienced and represented.
Curators Walk and Talk:
Saturday 29 August 2-3pm RSVP essential
EARLYWORK 330 South Terrace, South Fremantle
https://artitja.com.au/latest-exhibition/
Patrick Marlborough in Conversation with Danielle Raffaele
Wednesday 2 September 6:30 – 8:30pm
Join us at for a conversation with Patrick Marlborough, author of the screwball comedy revenge thriller Nock Loose. For this event, the author will be interviewed by journalist Danielle Raffaele.
Patrick Marlborough is an underemployed writer/comedian/drongo living with their parents in Walyalup, Western Australia. They have been published in Vice, Rolling Stone, The Guardian, The Saturday Paper, Slate, Gawker, Meanjin, Crikey, Kotaku, The Lifted Brow, Kill Your Darlings, Cordite, Going Down Swinging and various other forgotten blogs, magazines and anthologies. The manuscript for their first novel, A Horse Held at Gunpoint, was shortlisted for the Fogarty Literary Award in 2021 and is still looking for a publisher. They are the founder and editor of The Yeah Nah Review, as well as Wharf Rat Press. They co-author all of their work with the ghost of their bad dog, Buckley, who is solely responsible for any problematic elements therein. Nock Loose is their critically acclaimed debut novel, published by Fremantle Press.
Danielle Raffaele is a journalist, producer and broadcaster living in Walyalup, Fremantle. She has penned work for The West Australian, Sunday Times and North West Telegraph. She hosts a weekly Bookclub on RTRFM’s Breakfast programme.
Doors will open at 6.15pm for a 6.30pm start. Light refreshments provided and copies of Nock Loose available for purchase.
Fremantle Library 151 High Street, Fremantle
https://humanitix.com/au/events/au–fremantle–6160/recommended
A Musical Evening with Emily Barker (supported by Tim Darby)
Friday 25 September 6pm – 9pm
Emily Barker is an award-winning Australian singer-songwriter. She found early success as the writer and performer of the theme to the hugely successful BBC crime drama Wallander starring Kenneth Branagh and has since gone on to forge an acclaimed catalogue of releases, leading The Guardian to say “Emily Barker has a gift for great melodies”.
After 20 years and a raft of releases and collaborations, Barker recently relocated home to WA and is now based in Fremantle.
Barker’s latest album, Fragile as Humans, was produced at storied English studio The Wool Hall by Luke Potashnick (Gabrielle Aplin, Jack Savoretti). It followed 2020’s A Dark Murmuration of Words, which Uncut called “…a kind of Australian equivalent of PJ Harvey’s Let England Shake” and which NPR’s Ann Powers acclaimed as “One of the most literate and probing folk albums of the year.”
Barker has released music and toured as a solo artist as well as with various bands and collaborations – most notably her long associations with Mary Chapin Carpenter and Frank Turner – and has written for TV and film, including composing the soundtrack for Jake Gavin’s lauded debut feature Hector starring Peter Mullan and Keith Allen.
Ecoburbia
https://events.humanitix.com/a-musical-evening-with-tim-darby-and-emily-barker
Totally Lit
Friday 2 – 16 October 2026
Totally Lit is back to take over Fremantle / Walyalup with two amazing weeks of live literature events. From the Port to the Prison, from the beach to the bars, in the streets and in the sky, Totally Lit is here to prove that stories belong everywhere.
With nearly 60 unique events to choose from, we have something to offer all ages. With many events available free-of-charge we also have something to offer all budgets.
If there’s any missed local shows and events that are about to open, do make sure to email Gayle so we can include your show, event, gig.
* Arts Scene Around Freo is compiled by our Arts Editor, Gayle O’Leary. If you’d like your community event listed email Gayle here.
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