You may think you know Dark Mofo, but it’s likely that not even Dark Mofo knows what Dark Mofo will do next. Something pretty apparent is that the curatorial team behind this so-called ‘goth spring break’ has a knack of finding something that works, and then never doing it again.
Here are some clues to Dark Mofo 2018’s new offerings.
NIGHT MASS
LATE-NIGHT PARTY PRECINCT: MULTI-VENUE, MULTI-ARTIST, MULTI-NIGHT
Dark Mofo's late-night party precinct surrounding and subsuming the Odeon Theatre. More than 100 artists performing across five venues above and below ground, connected by an inner-city laneway, a party carpark and a closed CBD street.
Artworks, performances, cocktail lounges, liturgical raves, and a Lynchian Twin Peaks-tribute Bang Bang Bar, all tucked away in different corners of a sprawling nocturnal neighbourhood.
With different programming each night, artists will be announced closer to the festival. Worship the fullness of the night in our hidden city.
WATERBORNE FRENCH & MOTTERSHEAD (Australian exclusive)
Take a boat ride up the dead cold River Derwent, and listen to UK artist duo French & Mottershead (Rebecca French and Andrew Mottershead), Waterborne: an audio meditation on the process of a human body decaying in water, dissolving and disintegrating, as it is borne through a deepening estuary and out to the sea.
NEW VENUE: CARNEGIE GALLERY
Hobart’s old Maritime Museum is topped by a heritage gallery space, Carnegie Gallery. Disused for some decade now, it’s finally been refurbished with an accessible elevator, and Dark Mofo 2018 is opening the doors.
Shows at Carnegie Gallery:
ISLAND SHRINE: KEITH DEVERELL WITH FIONA HAMILTON
Walk across rings of ochre, burnt spears, charcoal and maireener shells, and take a seat. This brooding video and sound installation is inspired by Tarenorerer (also known as Walyer, 1800–1831), an Inidgenous Tasmanian warrior woman and tyrelore (island wife) who fought white colonists in Tasmania’s genocidal Black War.
NEW VENUE: BLACK TEMPLE GALLERY
This historic sandstone church, circa 1856 has seen some shit, including being one of the venues for last year’s Dark Mofo event, Welcome Stranger (Le1f, Miss Blanks and Betty Grumble were a few who graced the altar with decidedly unChristian performances).
This year, Dark Mofo is turning it into a gallery and theatre space, with Angelica Mesiti’s transcendental slow-mo moshpit film Rapture, and Tassie’s brave and contemporary ability-diverse theatre troupe Second Echo Ensemble with Sydney’s Garth Knight constructing a stage set from shibari-style rope and rock bondage.
Shows at Black Temple Gallery:
RAPTURE (SILENT ANTHEM) BY ANGELICA MESITI
Sermon, ceremony or concert? See if you can tell, in Rapture (silent anthem), a film where the camera tracks a crowd of young people as they watch an event open-air event. With the camera trained solely on the faces of the spectators, it is never revealed what spectacle they are beholding, whether a concert, sermon or ceremony.
BY MY HAND: SECOND ECHO ENSEMBLE (WORLD PREMIERE)
Break free from the suffocating status quo with this immersive work of physical theatre, performed in Sydney artist Garth Knight’s sublime and kinky shibari-style structure made from rock and rope. Features a live score played on invented and traditional instruments.
NEW VENUE: AVALON THEATRE
Built in 1892, the heritage listed Avalon Theatre has operated as a theatre, cinema, marketplace, and recording studio.
Highlights at the Avalon Theatre:
LAURA JEAN
Deep pop, dancing and the debut of Laura Jean’s latest album, Devotion: a new direction for the Melbourne artist formerly known for her folk music.
TINY RUINS & JESS RIBEIRO
The Kiwi psychedelic folk four-piece Tiny Ruins has collaborated with David Lynch, and will share the stage with Jess Ribeiro and her hazy, brooding rock’n’roll.
NOBODY (WILLIS EARL BEAL) (Australian exclusive)An unsettling and soulful collision of synths, blues and folk from the reclusive artist Nobody (Willis Earl Beal), masked, caped, and moody as an unsolved mystery.
JARBOE & FATHER MURPHY (AUSTRALIAN EXCLUSIVE)
The American shape-shifter of experimental music, Jarboe (formerly of Swans, Neurosis), takes to the stage with Italy’s duo of occult psychedelia and Catholic guilt, Father Murphy.
BORROWED VERSE
Australian and New Zealander songwriters and poets come together to tangle the traditions of music and poetry, with Borrowed Verse from William Butler Yeats and Charles Bukowski to Uncle Herb Wharton, Dorothy Porter, and Judith Wright. Featuring music by Tiny Ruins, Ben Salter, Angie Hart, Emily Lubitz (Tinpan Orange), Nausicaa, plus poetry from David Stavanger and Graham Akhurst.
CHRYSTA BELL WITH SPECIAL GUEST REBEKAH DEL RIO
It’s a David Lynch dream concert: fresh from a starring turn on Twin Peaks: The Return, the dream pop chanteuse and long-time Lynchian collaborator Chrysta Bell returns to Hobart. She’s joined by special guest and fellow Lynchian collaborator and alumni, Rebekah Del Rio, the impassioned, tragic crooner of Club Silencio in Mulholland Drive, and the Bang Bang Bar in Twin Peaks: The Return.
Head over to the Dark Mofo website for more details.
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