16th Annual O+ Festival
The 16th annual O+ Festival returns October 9 through 11 with more than 100 performers, artists, writers, comedians, filmmakers, and wellness practitioners spread across venues throughout Kingston. This year’s theme, “MO+NUMENTS,” asks what we choose to commemorate, who gets remembered, and how communities reshape inherited ideas of history and power.
The music lineup is led by Memphis roots-rock veterans Lucero, whose whiskey-soaked blend of punk, country, and heartland rock has earned a devoted following over the past quarter century. They’re joined by singer-songwriter Matt Pond PA, rapper and educator MC Lars, Pete Bernhard of The Devil Makes Three, DJ Alexis Krauss of Sleigh Bells, Guided By Voices guitarist Doug Gillard, Americana favorites The Mammals, Only Son, Gerry Leonard’s Spooky Ghost, Chris Maxwell, and JO+ni Jam, a tribute to Joni Mitchell featuring a rotating cast of guests. More than 60 percent of this year’s musical performers hail from the Hudson Valley, continuing O+’s longstanding commitment to showcasing regional talent alongside national acts.
Visual art remains central to the festival’s identity. Chicago muralist Sam Kirk headlines a public art program that also features Justin Lowe and Lon Clark, Casey Inch, and Hannah Williams, while exhibitions by Adriane Colburn, Jacinta Bunnell, and Lexa Walsh explore technology, ecology, memory, and community. Performance collective inkBoat returns with Nobody Told the Flowers to Come Up, an ecological meditation on climate and seasonal change.
In addition to participatory projects, projections, installations, and dance, the O+ Festival’s visual arts program embraces film as another way of exploring the human experience through light, sound, and storytelling. Among the highlights is Fiona Otway’s short documentary Into the Dark, which traces the friendship between the filmmaker and Hudson Valley photographer Pete Mauney while illuminating his fascination with fireflies. Mauney, whose mesmerizing images of the tiny bioluminescent insects graced the cover of Chronogram in August 2017, has spent years documenting their fleeting summer displays. The film becomes both an artist portrait and a meditation on wonder, patience, and the quiet relationships that develop between people and the natural world.
The literary program welcomes former Hole and Smashing Pumpkins bassist and Basilica Hudson cofounder Melissa Auf der Maur to discuss her new memoir, while Sunday’s WO+rd salon spotlights eight Hudson Valley writers reading original work. Comedy includes musical duo Griefcat, physical comedian Tippy Topwell, interactive act My Boy, and a slate of regional comics hosted by WAMC’s Sarah LaDuke.
Beyond the ticketed performances, O+ once again expands into the streets with the free BlO+ck Party in Uptown Kingston on October 10, featuring community organizations, vendors, health resources, and live entertainment. ExplO+re, the festival’s public wellness series, offers workshops in movement, sound healing, martial arts, mindfulness, and conversations with healthcare professionals.
Yet the concerts, murals, and readings are only part of the story. At the heart of O+ is the Artists’ Clinic, where participating musicians, writers, performers, visual artists, and volunteers receive healthcare in exchange for their contributions to the festival. Dental care, physical exams, acupuncture, chiropractic treatment, dermatology, nutrition counseling, mental health resources, and other services have become hallmarks of an exchange model that has grown well beyond a single weekend. Today, O+ operates year-round, connecting artists with low- or no-cost preventive healthcare while using the festival to sustain that mission.
That makes O+ something rarer than a successful arts festival. It is a healthcare nonprofit whose most visible fundraising campaign happens to look like one of the Hudson Valley’s best weekends of live music, public art, literature, and comedy. Every wristband sold helps underwrite care for the artists whose work gives the region much of its cultural life—a reminder that creativity doesn’t flourish on inspiration alone.
