BY CHRISTOPHER LEON
Welcome to the darkness. In this photoblog, I take you with me into Hobart’s Dark Mofo 2018 – a winter festival defined by controversy, sin, excellent food, and far too many drones.
Let’s get straight to the source of controversy: the inverted crosses. Thousands of members of Australia’s Christian community had called for the crosses’ early removal from the festival; Hobart Lord Mayor Ron Christie complained so much that the city wants him to resign. A glimpse at the water’s reflection reveals that it’s all a matter of perspective.
Dark Mofo was basically just a big drone fest, as I saw when exploring the Domain House one evening and witnessed festivalgoers relaxing on beanbags in the semi-abandoned space. They were getting deafened by the muffled drones of the late Lou Reed’s amps and guitars and feedback and hum and noise.
In an old tyre warehouse, four artworks were installed to signify the innermost thoughts of Risdon Prison inmates. This was The Pink Palace.
Here, these wired potatoes (no, really) were supposedly powering a little clock – “the potato becomes a fictional currency within the time-based economy of incarceration” as stated in the program. A little bland for my taste.
Pretty much the entire town was painted red. There was, for once, a pulse in the heart of the winter city. In Hadley’s Orient Hotel, an anonymous masked ball was underway. I didn’t attend, but rumour has it that things heated up with one particularly physical act (keep reading and you’ll learn why).
In another controversial work of live installation, performance artist Mike Parr was buried under a major city street. Perhaps the insular space will be used to restrain (and gag) the Lord Mayor from saying anything too silly next year?
A few streets away was Night Mass – revealing one of the inverted crosses in the middle of the city. Night Mass created its own cultural district with a few venues and (and plenty of drones).
Even the Centrepoint car park was alight with red, white, blue; and pumping bass. Below this cross, the amps projected music that was simultaneously performed inside the nearby Odeon Theatre.
Drones, drones, drones, drones. And some big balloons in the Odeon (with strobes. And drones).
There was a fair bit of nudity at the festival – rumour had it that a live sex act was performed by one individual on the night stage.
(Editor’s note: We’ve asked Dark Mofo for an artist statement, predicting it will be gold.)
This was the Bang Bang Bar in Night Mass. About 20 metres around the corner, an individual took it on himself to invent his own bang and fire a few shots in a cocktail bar. Luckily, not a single person was injured. But it certainly felt safer inside the Night Mass district than in the city streets beyond.
Moving on. I indulged in some Stilton jaffles and 10-year-old whisky in Dark Park. There was a general Twin Peaks vibe, offset by this makeshift ski resort.
Behind this ski lodge, we all wrote down our deepest fears…
…and cast them into the Ogoh-Ogoh. A newly practised Tasmanian tradition (drawn from an Indonesian tradition), this year’s beast was a spider and web, awaiting The Burning to come.
This was also at Dark Park, but didn’t quite look the same from on the ground.
There were serious Stanley Kubrick vibes at this orb art in Dark Park, taking over the David Lynch tradition if only for a moment…
This year’s Dark Mofo Winter Feast was a rich indulgence of Tasmanian produce and smoke inhalation.
Nearby, waves and inverted waves and drones and rubble at the Maritime Museum. This work evoked reflection on Tasmania’s Aboriginal history: the rough waves were cast in black and white; perhaps representing the Black War and the cultural battle and turmoil.
Modern opera, anyone? This one was Backwards from Winter – an inspiring concept that rarely hit the mark. It was composed by Douglas Knehans with libretto by Juanita Rockwell, and mise-en-scene by Constantine Koukias.
Soprano Judith Weusten gave a standout performance in the Hobart City Hall as she sang accompanied by Antonis Pratsinakis on electric cello. The sound design and electronic music component was a little lacking in terms of quality of synths, leaving it sounding underprocessed.
The concept was okay – the performance ran backwards through the seasons of a year, telling the tragic story of two lovers from death through to life.
This order had potential to provide distinct emotions through the retelling of your usual love story, but in reverse. Though, distinctions between the seasons were never quite clear; and the mood and feeling of the music just blended together without any seemingly emotional changes despite the narrative.
I thought this year’s Dark Mofo had a subtle theme of the sea – and I heard this in the Tasmanian Symphony Orchestra’s Eternal at the Federation Concert Hall (pictured below). The performance began with Arvo Pärt’s Spiegel im Spiegel – did you catch our (Literally) Live Review? This set a mellow tone, dissimilar to the sex-and-death theme of Dark Mofo itself.
The performance transitioned immediately into the second piece: Henryk Górecki’s Piano Concerto (performed by Tamara-Anna Cislowska). This immediately changed the atmosphere, setting the basis for the rest of the show – all of which was performed underneath a giant, illuminating cross suspended above the players. The lines of the piano in this concerto were reminiscent of the sea; its rough waves rising and falling.
The third piece introduced the TSO Chorus to the stage for Pärt’s Berliner Messe. The singers arranged themselves in front of the orchestra, creating a wall of voices. This piece was a highlight of the night’s performance, which led into Vasks conducted by Johannes Fritzsch.
The final Górecki – Kleines Requiem fur eine Polka – was a turbulent affair; here, it seemed waves could be heard crashing down through the music, resulting in a climax. At this point, the white cross lit up the entire concert hall (to the point of blinding the audience) before receding into a lingering conclusion.
The Hobart Convict Penitentiary hosted several exhibits throughout the site. I walked in to see this glowing plaque before descending the tiny staircases into the tunnels underneath the courtroom. Echoes could be heard in the empty and pitch-black corridors.
In what I assume to be the chapel, a trippy video installation used creative post-production effects to blend several films together. It revealed a seamless train ride through various locations, from warehouse to country to city, accompanied by even more drones. This was The Return by Byron Perry + Aron Hemingway, New/Old light (curated by Stevie S. Han).
The Invisible House exhibition in the Salamanca Arts Centre, just a few steps away from the feast, showed 30 photographs by William Mortensen. They were on display for the first time and were in Hobart on loan from New York’s Stephen Romano Gallery.
The artist himself was an American photographer from the turn of the 19th-20th Century, famous for Hollywood photos but also for his artistic images of religious torture and nudity.
On the far left, you’ll see our favourite one – Nicholo Paganini (The Devil’s Violinist) circa 1930. On the far right, a self-portrait of the photographer. Drones could be heard from performance artists in a nearby space (yes, more drones).
Victorian Opera’s performance of Britten’s The Rape of Lucretia was a modern take on the original, with a few twists including gender roles being swapped and, consequently, existing themes explored in new ways.
The opera itself was well-executed, with notable performances by the ‘Male Chorus’ character (Nicholas Jones), and Junius (Jane Sheldon). It tackled several issues around gender roles, brutality, Christianity, and female oppression.
However, I struggled to comprehend how I should view the performance: Was it serious when there were elements of comic relief directed into the show? The mixed messages only made the idea of gender role reversal more confusing when, at the climax of the performance, gender roles were reversed back and assumed the original opera’s identities.
The Tasmanian Symphony Orchestra provided a solid foundation for the singers on stage.
As the festival officially came to an end, the Ogoh-Ogoh (remember the spider from before?) was marched through the city to its death in Dark Park before many thousands of watchers, each eager to burn their fears. The flaming web looked pretty epic against the bleakness of the winter night. Welcome to The Burning.
Finally, marking the end of it all, a visit to the Mona site at midnight. Ryoji Ikeda’s Spectra shone into the sky – visible from most any point in Hobart and its surrounds. The source of the light was at Mona and I stood among the beams getting blinded and looking like Mr Bean.
But in all seriousness, I marvelled at the power of the lights. When you stared through the beams, it looked almost artificial – the columns of light appearing as physical objects. A soundscape lingered on in a magical sense (a favourite drone of the festival so far).
I’m looking forward to next year’s controversies (assuming Dark Mofo doesn’t get sent away to Far North Queensland, that is).
Images courtesy Dark Mofo, Hobart, Tasmania, Australia.
