On December 14th, Jet Williams launched Off the Rails at Art Atrium in Botany, the neighbourhood where he grew up. It sold out on the night.
The event wasn’t a bookshop reading. It was a full exhibit built from nothing. Williams and filmmaker Max Dona planned the whole thing themselves, sourcing everything from Facebook Marketplace and the side of the road. Free couches. Rugs pulled off kerbs. Their parents’ TVs rigged up as a screening bay for the in-person premiere of Dona’s documentary These City Circles, which follows a new generation of Sydney’s graffiti writers and urban explorers. The film has never been shown since.
The space was hosted by Daniel & Daphne Projects in Botany, whose founder Scott Hull backed the vision and gave them the room at a fraction of the cost. From there it was all hands. Jet’s dad was nailing frames into the walls. His mum was sorting food and drinks. Mates showed up early to help build it out. The whole thing was assembled in hours by the people closest to it.
The space was set up to feel open. Tables with markers and pens. Music playing. People drawing together, tagging the couches, writing on things. It was encouraged. The room was loud, packed, alive. Over a hundred people showed up. People were smoking out the front, crowding in around the art, talking to strangers. While the crowd waited for the documentary screening, Dona was still backstage finishing the edit, exporting the film right up to the last minute because he wanted to get it as close to perfect as possible. To keep the energy going, rappers from the audience jumped on the mic and started freestyling. Nobody planned it. It just happened.
The night was hosted by social media personality Kayhapps, who kept the energy moving between the art, the screenings, and the panel.
Four artists exhibited alongside Williams. BOKEN showed paintings rooted in Sydney’s street culture, detailed cartoon scenes packed with characters, trains, and city life.
Dylan Darcy presented an archive of photographs from 2015, shot while exploring the city’s tunnels and rooftops as a teenager. FUMES installed a real Sydney train door, repurposed as a screen for underground footage, and displayed archival garments printed with transit network blueprints. Arc’teryx, North Face, and Montbell jackets with real rail lines mapped across them.
Each piece connected back to the same world the novel documents.
Williams exhibited a decade-old archive of his own photographs, many of which appear in the book. Rooftops, tunnels, abandoned buildings. Images made before documentation was the goal. He also built his own CCTV art installation using a GoPro and a Raspberry Pi that tracked audience members as they moved through the exhibit.
Jet sold out every copy of Off the Rails within the first hour. People who arrived later had to leave empty handed.
The night closed with a panel. People packed in around the lounges while Williams and Dona talked about why they made what they made. Williams on the book. Dona on the film. Both stories shaped by the same city, the same restless need to see it differently.
No sponsors. No venue hire. No budget. Just a room full of people who showed up because something real was happening.
Off the Rails is available now through our stockists worldwide.