Why a city car park is turning into Canberra’s coolest art venue: introducing ARTPARK

Posted on 12 October, 2026

Twenty artists, three bands, and two DJs across three floors of a city car park. This is ARTPARK.

ARTPARK is changing the game when it comes to celebrating Canberra’s emerging talent, transforming the 5 Nangari Street car park into one of the coolest venues in the city on Saturday 17 October.

Creating an art hub in a very unexpected location – complete with two bars, art hung on temporary walls and DJS in utes – the event marks a major moment for MOONLIGHTING, a collaboration between two Canberra-based art devotees.

ARTPARK is the sixth event in two years for founders Claudia Hunt and Riley Curtain, who say that the aim was to go ‘bigger, bolder and weirder’ than ever before.

“We wanted to do something a little more unusual. We were looking for venues that matched our ethos about utilising disused Canberran or unusual spaces around the city but weren’t somewhere you’d expect to find a gallery,” explains Claudia.

“A carpark is a multi-storey, ready-built structure. We liked the industrial look – especially the one we’re using for ARTPARK.”

Moving from Hobart and Sydney respectively, Riley and Claudia met at university during an exchange to Shanghai where they discovered a shared love of contemporary Australian art.

They realised that there was a gap in the Canberra market for emerging artists, and decided to start MOONLIGHTING to give them the opportunities to reach new audiences, showcase their work and earn money. Both Riley and Claudia are still studying and working while running MOONLIGHTING on the side, making the business a pure passion project dedicated to Canberra’s artistic community.

“In our very own small way on our own little patch of earth, we were trying to provide actual, real financial opportunity for emerging artists and an opportunity to build their career in Canberra,” says Riley.

“We’re not a permanent gallery; it’s on a show-by-show basis, but the business model is such that we pay all of our artists – both for showing with us and by giving them the opportunity to sell.”

“It was seeing that gap – you have art school and the National Gallery and if you’re emerging; that’s a pretty insurmountable gap,” adds Claudia.

ARTPARK will bring together a range of artists from the Canberra community, and is being held in collaboration with Such and Such and the Canberra Art Biennial, with support from Molonglo Group.

Spanning visual mediums and music, the three-storey event space will come alive from 7.30 pm as 25 creatives gather – and each floor will have something different.

On the first floor, attendees will start their ARTPARK journey with a drink from the bar and explore large-scale installation works, with the opportunity to buy artworks and merchandise from participating artists.

The second floor is the main exhibition space – which will house most of the art – while the third floor is a dance floor, complete with live music and another bar.

Sydney based band kate moth, Sonic Reducer (who have just been featured in Rolling Stone Australia) and Dislodged will be taking the stage while later in the night, DJs Sekai Mututu and ambrosia will help people dance the night away.

But while it sounds like a party unlike anything Canberra has seen before, Claudia and Riley say that ARTPARK is as much for the artists as it is for the public.

“We hope artists get so much out of this,” says Claudia. “The biggest thing for us is that immediate financial compensation – we think that too often artists are asked to do things for exposure.”

“Longer term – especially with ARTPARK – we hope that they get a lot of long-time fans. People who will follow their career, begin collecting their work and who will be able to give them the long-term support their practice needs.”

Showcasing the works of emerging artists like Josh Hughes, Giselle Dunn, Bridget Baskerville and Florence Steel, ARTPARK isn’t just for ‘arty’ people.

It’s also for anyone interested in culture, music, and community – or who are looking to do something a little bit different on a Saturday night.

“If you’re not interested in art, you might come along anyway and find that it’s easy to learn about the work and connect with the artists story,” explains Claudia.

“Being from Hobart and having watched Dark Mofo and Mona grow up – obviously on a bigger scale and with a slightly different ambition – they’ve shown Tasmanians that anything is possible even though you live on a tiny island at the end of the world,” adds Riley.

“It would be nice that in our own way we can encourage Canberrans to dream a little bigger.”

Photography: Cassie Abraham.