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Time Out
19-06-2025
- Entertainment
- Time Out
An honest review of Dark Mofo: I screamed into the abyss, and I'd do it again
Where do we draw the line between art that is dark, provocative and challenging, and that which is outright tasteless, excessive, and wrong? Dark Mofo specialises in dancing ferociously on this tedious edge. The Hobart festival just wrapped up its fiery 2025 return with the customary procession and burning of the Ogoh-Ogoh – a giant totem-like effigy crafted by Balinese artists – and it appears that leaning into the provocative has once again (mostly) paid off. (The Mercury is reporting that the festival's return has been an economic success, drawing in more than $50-million dollars in tourist revenue.) Drawing inspiration from pagan solstice rituals, the midwinter festival is all about embracing the blackness of winter, leaning into mischief and debauchery (a suitable theme for a festival spearheaded by MONA, the equally-divisive gallery that put Hobart on the map). Needless to say, I jumped at the chance to finally pop my Dark Mofo cherry this year. And while some detractors are theorising that Dark Mofo has 'lost its edge', what I discovered was a town painted red by a new-age 'Goth Christmas' – and I learned that when you embrace the dark, you might just find the light. Took a knee and screamed into the abyss I was greeted by a discordant chorus of screams as I trudged along Hobart's old industrial waterfront towards Dark Park (a family-friendly festival precinct marked by massive art installations and open fire pits). Just past the site's entrance, which is flanked by towers shooting fireballs into the sky, was a billboard-sized artwork with a message spelled out in large fluorescent letters: 'I'VE COMPOSED A NEW NATIONAL ANTHEM – TAKE A KNEE AND SCREAM UNTIL YOU CAN'T BREATHE'. A theme-park-like soundscape of squeals and yells added to the festival's atmosphere of 'Disneyland, but make it dark'. I dropped to my knees amongst a sea of grown adults, small children and crackly-voiced adolescents, and emptied my lungs into a cathartic roar. I felt lighter – like I had just been given permission to open a release-valve on some of the emotional baggage I had unwillingly hauled to Hobart with me. But later, when reading up on the origins of the artwork ('Neon Anthem' by Nicholas Galanin, a First Nations Tlingit and Unangax artist from Alaska) I couldn't help but feel uncomfortable about the way the piece's original message (as a pointed statement about the tragic murders of men of colour that sparked the Black Lives Matter movement) would be left unexplored by the majority of festivalgoers that came into contact with it. (As well as Dark Mofo itself, whose one-line description of the artwork is pretty light on details.) Witnessed a spectacular high-speed car crash The main act of Dark Mofo's opening weekend was a high-adrenaline piece of performance art, centered on two vehicles locked in a high-speed dance culminating in a visceral head-on collision. Standing amongst the spectators of all ages (some still in prams) gathered in the grandstands on the far side of Dark Park at the Regatta Grounds (where folks would usually gather for sailing events), I felt like I was witnessing the modern-day equivalent to a gladiator battle. The opponents participating in 'Crash Body': Brazilian artist Paula Garcia (performing the latest chapter of a two-decade-long project) going head-to-head with a professional stunt driver. Many spectators peeled off during a tense waiting period where nothing much happened, but when the drivers finally took off, the action was swift and explosive. Being stuck at the back of the crowd and cursed by my modest height, I didn't manage to see the moment of impact, but I heard it – the unmistakable smack of machine against machine – followed by a rising plume of white smoke, and a spontaneous roar of cheers and applause. Waiting around for the performance to start in earnest may have been uncomfortable, but that was nothing compared to the stress of the wait for the artist to emerge from her car. The stunt driver extracted himself quite quickly, but a sense of unease settled over the crowd as we waited for Garcia to be freed from the crumpled car. ('What if she's, like, is actually hurt?') The cheers that erupted when she did, eventually, get out and wave were next level. How ethical is it to perform a very-possibly-deadly stunt to a big crowd? Especially when car accidents needlessly claim so many lives in this country? I haven't quite made my mind up about this – but any spectacle that can draw rev-heads and connoisseurs of the Fast and the Furious franchise to take an interest in art will certainly get a nod of approval from me. Got yelled at by blasphemous puppets at a rave in a former Hillsong Church After the prams packed in for the night, Dark Mofo's adults-only antics kicked on at Night Mass: God Complex, a 'temple of unrest' and 'shrine to excess' in a secret location – aka, an enormous rave taking over what savvy punters have deduced to be a former Hillsong hub, and also sprawling out into a closed-off street. In one room, a pair of felt puppets dressed up as a nun and a festooned priest held court from above a central bar, hurling hilarious insults at punters like a more sacrilegious answer to those old geezers from The Muppets. In another room, DJs hyped up the crowd from a dynamic stage surrounded by screens and glowing Matrix -esque tubes. In the largest space, a procession of excellent bands and live acts played from two alternating stages on a constant loop – one above the crowd, and one on their level (note: balcony stages are underrated, we need more of them!). And upstairs, we were invited to enter a maze to discover mystery art and performers – including a real nude person nestled in the body of a decaying oversized shark, and a barbershop manned by a lingerie-wearing drag queen on a mission to shave off the eyebrows of willing(?) volunteers. Goths bumped elbows with ravers in outfits rigged with strobe lights, eshays, art girlies and middle-aged couples. I was reminded of some of the best nightlife I've ever experienced: Marrickville warehouse parties where you'd be texted the location at the last minute, the unmatched glory of a queer club on a good night, the infectious untz-untz of a remote bush rave, and the hedonic dancefloors of the now-retired Hellfire Club (pour one out for Sydney's longest-running fetish themed nightclub). However, and this is just my personal experience – I was also reminded of how much better nightlife can be when it's centered on a particular subculture or group. When queer performers dance to straight-leaning audiences, it just isn't the same. When I overhear bros on the dancefloor cracking fat jokes, it doesn't feel like we are all fam in this clerb, in fact. (And I'll add, when I can't find a cloakroom at an event on a chilly winter night, I'm gonna get shitty about carrying around my coat.) Night Mass (and Dark Mofo as a whole) is optimised for a broad audience to get a taste of the subversive. That's not necessarily a bad thing – I believe that everyone is better for having a subversive nightlife experience – and it is quite successful at what it sets out to do. (And I've noticed that many artists and performers I admire have been booked because of it, to boot.) Discovered a big, sexy demonic statue on a rain-soaked nighttime art crawl At many spots around Hobart, you can pick up a free map for Dark Mofo's 'Art Walk', which will lead you into all sorts of interesting nooks and crannies to discover works that are strange, beautiful, and also so deeply disturbing that you might find yourself questioning where the line crosses to full-blown trauma porn. From a rooftop on the harbourfront, a gargantuan human hand with a face glares down at festivalgoers (that'll be 'Quasi' by New Zealand artist Ronnie van Hout). In a decommissioned church, a giant, pale, pixie-like creature squats in front of an old organ, razor-sharp teeth are bared from behind its pouting lips (Travis Ficarra's 'Chocolate Goblin' – a highlight for me). Opposite this figure emanating desire and disgust, a pre-recorded performance video depicts a woman (who looks sort of like the little girl from The Ring grew up) delivering a deep, guttural vocal performance that transcends metal to a meditative state ('Mortal Voice' by Karina Utomo and Cura8). Questioned the ethics of trauma porn and violence for art's sake In an abandoned-seeming corporate building, visitors climb the stairs to find a screening of a real performance in which the artist (naked and exposed) is hanging from a noose, and his audience must work together to hold the weight of his body and prevent him from asphyxiating (Carlos Martiel's 'Cuerpo'). Quietly troubling, Martiel's piece is designed to echo the violent public acts of lynching in 19th and 20th-century America (and I'm not so sure that guy who went in at the same time as me should have brought in his young sons…). In the same building, in an experience I only learned of secondhand, an artwork invited viewers to walk down a narrow passageway and squeeze past a man dressed in all-black who would violently swing around a police baton, beating on the walls (Paul Setúbal's 'Because The Knees Bend'). It is things like this that raise uncomfortable questions about the festival's 'theme park of trauma' approach. There are far too many people who don't need to seek out art in order to understand the threat of violence, either from a guy who looks like a riot squad cop, or otherwise. With devastating conflicts and active genocides playing out while politicians wring their hands, and headlines of atrocities flash in our newsfeeds cushioned between thirst traps and Labubu-core recession indicators, what do we get out of replicated violence? Is it enough that it starts a conversation? Found a basement filled with real sheep heads in jars (almost 500 of them) Taking the crown for Dark Mofo's most horrifying artwork this year is Indigenous Tasmanian/Trawulwuy artist Nathan Maynard's 'We threw them down the rocks where they had thrown the sheep'. I joined a short queue on a regular street, and descended into the musty, dimly lit basement of an old furniture store to discover rows of industrial shelving filled with a total of 480 jars – each of them holding a real, preserved sheep head. A confronting display (even for a casual taxidermy enthusiast like myself), Maynard's installation goes a lot deeper than gore – using flesh to "lay bare the legacy of cultural theft and erasure" and call attention to the remains of First Nations ancestors from around the globe "languishing in museums and their storerooms'. The artwork makes direct reference to the 1828 Cape Grim massacre, in which about 30 Aboriginal men were killed by four shepherds – one of many mass killings of Indigenous people during a period in Tasmania known as the Black War (1824-1832) – solemnly calling attention to the horrors of colonial violence. This artwork's provocative approach raises a lot of ethical questions, including whether it should have been presented at all. But, it certainly got people talking, and if anyone has a right to take control of this narrative, it's an Indigenous artist from Tasmania. Saw the most beautiful and primal dance I've ever seen (by a performer coated in mystery goo) Meditative, strangely alluring, transcendently beautiful and somewhat intimidating – Joshua Serafin's VOID will live on in my subconscious for some time. Drawing on this multidisciplinary artist's Filipino heritage and tapping into a divine queer energy, VOID is a performance complete with a 'splash zone'. (The first few rows of the audience were actually provided with plastic ponchos, and the heritage chairs they sat in at Hobart's Theatre Royal – the oldest continually operating theatre in Australia – were also plastic-wrapped.) A suitable fit for the Dark Mofo brief, the piece challenges its audiences with its mystery and slow build. After a lengthy instrumental segment, Serafin emerges – nude, writhing, and illuminated by blue poles of light – to execute a ferociously charged dance punctuated by yelps of passion and rage. Then, following a brief video segment, the piece builds into one of the most stunning displays you'll ever see. Serafin covers their body in a strange, black viscous liquid that's whipped through the air, and some is even flung onto unsuspecting audience members (seated a row behind the sanctioned splash zone, the person sitting next to me copped a wallop of goo). The mystery liquid catches the light in a dazzling way, and the sound of it splashing and smacking on the stage intermingles with the pant of the performer's breath and the immersive music. This is the quality performance art that you want to see platformed at an internationally-recognised festival. Stood dangerously close to a fiery storm of molten metal In the gloom of a subterranean gallery at MONA, sparks are flying – liquid metal to be exact, heated to 1500°C, dripping down from the ceiling in dramatic waves of firelight. Without the fireproof screen standing between me and this transfixing spectacle, this would be a disastrous encounter. But it's actually another more unsuspecting piece in this exhibition that is more likely to disfigure me. As I approach a big block of wood clamped by an odd mechanical device, a gallery attendant warns me not to stand too close – this artwork is designed to break. In the opposite corner, I spot a pile of splintered hunks of wood cast off from previous days. I wonder how large the pile will grow by the time the exhibition closes in April. MONA unveiled in the end, the beginning, the first Australian solo show from Italian artist Arcangelo Sassolino, alongside Dark Mofo's other provocations. It feels reductive to simply refer to Sassolino as a sculptor. Channelling his interest in mechanics and technology, he creates dynamic, kinetic pieces that test the laws of physics – using force, tension, speed, heat and gravity to create dramatic transformations. Aside from the fiery spectacle of the collection's title piece, this exhibition is actually rather quiet and contemplative. As the artist toils to 'free matter from a predetermined form', we are prompted to ponder how we can push and shape ourselves, our circumstances, and perhaps even the world around us beyond what keeps us stuck. Lost (and found) myself in an elaborate mirrored maze With only a few days to explore the excesses of Dark Mofo, I didn't find the time to write down my fears on a note to be burned up with all the others stuffed inside the Ogoh-ogoh effigy before it was set alight. However, I did stumble into my own unexpected ritual of release. The culprit? The 'House of Mirrors'. After touring all over the country, this kaleidoscopic maze created by Australian installation artists Christian Wagstaff and Keith Courtney has stood on the grounds of MONA since 2016. As I made my approach, the attendant outside the gate informed me that some people figure it out in two minutes, while others could take upwards of twenty minutes. (I fell firmly into the latter category, as did many people I continuously bumped into on the inside.) As I cautiously rounded corners, confronted by kaleidoscopic multiples of my own reflection, I became increasingly discombobulated by the maze's dizzying passages. I wound up back at the entrance more than once, and the temptation to give up and take the easy escape was real. But something called me back into the unknown. Despite my weariness, I was determined – and yes, finding my new direction involved taking some wrong turns and a terrifying amount of uncertainty. But I pressed on, energised by the darkness and decadence I had spent the weekend immersed in – and eventually, a new stream of light emerged, and I had found the way to the other side. I felt a quiet sense release upon the realisation that I had freed myself by following my own winding path, and it was more satisfying than retracing my steps ever could be. What does Dark Mofo get right? Rather than fighting it, Dark Mofo embraces the chilling darkness of winter nights. Random shopfronts are illuminated by the festival's signature hue of glowing red as you navigate your way between experiences. Embracing the chilling blackness of the night, Dark Mofo is able to tap into something that other winter festivals in Australia haven't quite been able to capture. It could have something to do with Hobart's size – the vibe is more like a big regional town than a capital city, which balances expectations (the quiet patches between activations and lively venues feel less stark than the lulls in the Vivid Sydney lightwalk, for example). It could also have something to do with the festival's themes – audiences expect the art to be provocative, challenging, dark, and divisive – you go in knowing that it might not be your cup of tea, that it might even be intended to leave you feeling a little sick in the stomach, and thus, you're less likely to feel let down, compared to something that promises a grand dazzling spectacle. Not that Dark Mofo is devoid of spectacle – quite the opposite, actually. Similar to the Biennale of Sydney's 2024 theme, which leaned into the transgressive origins of carnival – Dark Mofo speaks to our need for ritual, for celebration, and to be connected with others in order to move through change and confusion, process pain and grief, and to cope with the exquisite ecstasy, agony and mundanity of being alive. After making my first pilgrimage, I for one, can say that I'll be back for more.
Boston Globe
13-06-2025
- Entertainment
- Boston Globe
In Boston's sprawling Triennial exhibition, an Indigenous artist's evocations of cultural extinction haunt
Get Starting Point A guide through the most important stories of the morning, delivered Monday through Friday. Enter Email Sign Up Nicholas Galanin, "Aáni yéi xat duwasáakw (I am called Land)," 2025. Courtesy of the artist and Peter Blum Gallery, New York. (Mel Taing) Mel Taing Advertisement The spectacle, penetrating and unnerving, is the work of — nothing living, at least — wins. Advertisement Galanin, who is Tlingít and Unangax̂, has always worked on broader themes of Indigenous resilience and self-determination in the wake of centuries of colonial exploitation and dominance. Outside, Galanin's work often has a wry, gallows-humor edge, and the laughs are pretty grim. It's hard to argue they should be otherwise. But the future is important to Galanin, and his insistence that there is one is not to be ignored. Nicholas Galanin, "I think it goes like this (pick yourself up)," 2025. (Faith Ninivaggi) Faith Ninivaggi His work in recent years has included the giant text installation 'Never Forget,' Advertisement The inversion, blunt and confrontational, takes stock of shameful history, while projecting, unabashedly, a future goal. The landback movement is real, in motion, and has marked some successes at least north of the border: In Canada, Indigenous land claims have resulted in Nicholas Galanin, "Never Forget," 2021. (Lance Gerber) Lance Gerber Here in Boston, Galanin wades into a particular history with a knowing wink. Northwest Indigenous motifs — the familiar red and black depictions of whales, ravens, bear, turtles, among others, using simple geometric forms — are among the best known and most popular Native American icons in the country, reproduced and sold as tourist trinkets by the million. Land is a commodity too, Galanin knows; as a piece of public art, 'I think it goes like this' nods to an Indigenous resurgence that needs to be more than cultural and aesthetic, but rooted in the earth — a progression that remains too slow, and now hampered by a federal government with different priorities. Since January, the Trump administration has Here in New England, Indigenous tribes — the Wampanoag and Penobscot among them — have endured centuries of colonial rule; through those traumas, recent years have seen their cultures start to thrive again in very public ways. Just around the corner from Galanin's piece on Evans Way, — the kind of institution where, generations past, Indigenous culture was ossified and entombed. With the commission, the museum acknowledges Indigenous culture as not only living, but thriving, and projects it to the world. Advertisement Nicholas Galanin, "I think it goes like this (pick yourself up)," 2025. (Faith Ninivaggi) Faith Ninivaggi That 'The Knowledge Keepers,' and 'I think it goes like this' sit out in open for all to see is significant. They are things you negotiate by simple fact of being in the city, whether by choice or not. 'I think it goes like this,' however, is sly; while 'The Knowledge Keepers' insists on a vibrant Indigenous present, Galanin's piece implies a complicated future of adaptation and reinvention, again and again. Indigenous progress has never been a straight line; in this regressive moment, Galanin reminds us that Indigenous people are well versed in making and remaking, for as long as it takes. Nicholas Galanin: 'Aáni yéi xat duwasáak (I am called Land)' At the MassArt Museum, 621 Huntington Ave, through Nov. 30. 'I think it goes like this (pick yourself up),' a project of the Boston Public Art Triennial. At Evans Way Park, 1 Evans Way, through Oct. 21. Advertisement Murray Whyte can be reached at
The Guardian
12-06-2025
- Entertainment
- The Guardian
‘A space for mourning' or a trauma theme park? Dark Mofo struggles with its most powerful works
It's dusk on Friday as we follow the sounds of screaming through a former industrial estate in downtown Hobart. My friend and I arrive at a field of astroturf facing a 12-metre-wide scaffold emblazoned with neon white text that reads: 'I'VE COMPOSED A NEW NATIONAL ANTHEM. TAKE A KNEE AND SCREAM UNTIL YOU CAN'T BREATHE.' As we watch, a group of four young boys follow the instructions, their pubescent voices fraying, while a fifth boy films them. In front of them, five women line up and perform the action, laughing, while a security guard takes a photo. 'Cute,' says my companion. I tell her that the artist dedicated this work to Black deaths in custody. Her face falls. We're in Dark Mofo festival's family-friendly precinct Dark Park – a playground of big art and bars, food trucks and fire-pits. Like Mona, the private museum from which it sprung, Dark Mofo presents art largely without labels and wall text, liberating viewers from the tyranny of orthodoxy. But information can be empowering, too – and some art experiences are richer for it. The signage for this particular work bears only its title, Neon Anthem, and the artist, Nicholas Galanin. The one-line description on the festival website reads: 'A space for mourning, protest, and catharsis. Take a knee.' Galanin, a First Nations Tlingit and Unangax artist from Alaska, created the first iteration of this installation for the Seattle Art Museum. The text, he wrote, is 'a pointed reference to the murders of Eric Garner, George Floyd, Tyre Nichols, and all people of color who have been murdered at the hands of police and agents of the American state'. 'Asking participants to take a knee is a position of deference and worship turned refusal,' Galanin said. 'Asking them to scream until they can't breathe encompasses protest and prayer aimed at tearing down the systems built to enforce Whiteness, White privilege, heteropatriarchy, and capitalist control.' It's disorienting to encounter such a work in an amusement park-style context, among laughing families and groups of friends. They've come here for a fun night out or a sensory adventure: in a shed next door you can clamber into a coffin and get your photo taken, followed by a cocktail and a cheese platter; in a nearby concrete hangar you'll find a mesmerising kinetic light display. Revisiting Galanin's work over Dark Mofo's opening weekend, I witnessed moments of catharsis – but there was no obvious sense of mourning or protest. It felt particularly notable on a weekend where rallies were happening across Australia in response to the death in custody of 24-year-old disabled Warlpiri man Kumanjayi White. This sense of dissonance persisted across the weekend, which featured multiple political works about violence (often racist violence) presented without contextual information. These works often happened in unconventional spaces – including a store basement and a former bank vault – among predominantly white audience members who, for the most part, seemed curious-but-perplexed, or in search of a thrill. I watched a woman browse her phone in front of a massive video artwork showing Afro-Cuban performance artist Carlos Martiel naked and strung up from a ceiling beam by a hangman's noose. I listened to people laughing and discussing their evening plans while wandering through Trawulwuy artist Nathan Maynard's installation of 480 sheep heads, commemorating a massacre of Aboriginal people in Tasmania's north west. I saw a smiling teenage boy wander through a narrow corridor as Brazilian performance artist Paul Setúbal, dressed in riot gear, belted the walls with a baton in a work inspired by his childhood experience of police violence. Encountering these and other works in a compressed time frame, I sometimes felt as though I was in a trauma theme park, where tourists came to be entertained by the artists' lived experiences. Presenting provocative art to unsuspecting audiences in strange places is Dark Mofo's MO, and its frequent magic. Ask any devotee what they love about the festival, and they'll tell you stories of unexpected adventures and strange encounters; the work they stumbled upon by chance and were enchanted, shocked or thrilled by. Mystery and surprise are crucial ingredients in this recipe, which explains the minimal contextual info provided – no map or app to see what is where, and no explanatory wall texts. People tend to follow the smell of smoke, the sound of beats, or the red lighting and neon crosses that mark festival venues. Variety is also key to Dark Mofo. This year, political and profound art rubbed shoulders with the playful and the puerile: you could wander into a 19th century masonic lodge to see a supersized screen showing a gruelling trial-by-baptism in a salt lake, endured by artist Ida Sophia; you could also walk into a church and find a giant nude goblin with its tits out, throwing peace salutes (Travis Ficarra's Chocolate Goblin). But in this fun park atmosphere, art that is more complex or political risks being trivialised, reduced or obscured. At Maynard's installation, audiences were forced to rely on invigilators and a sometimes unclear soundtrack to provide key context. A friend overheard one of the attendants tell visitors that the artwork was about 'Aboriginal people [who] took some sheep. The British punished them and threw them off a cliff'. For an artwork geared at educating non-Indigenous viewers, the presentation was flawed. Other works fared better. Filipino artist Joshua Serafin performed his eco-sexual dance ritual Void to a full and fully-attentive house at Theatre Royal for 50 minutes, four nights in a row, receiving standing ovations. Paula Garcia's Crash Body – a 50kph head-on collision between two cars – worked as a context-free spectacle; you didn't need to know about her longstanding interest in violence, or her experience growing up during the cold war, to appreciate it. Paul Setúbal's participatory performance Because The Knees Bend was a standout: an effective and fascinating social experiment. A menacing, enforcer-style figure, Setúbal stalked menacingly up and down a narrow, brightly-lit corridor in a decommissioned underground bank vault, enacting violence on its walls. When one person dared to walk through, others began to follow. Setúbal quickly became the least interesting aspect of the performance: the real theatre was how you and other audience members reacted. Setúbal says all his works attempt to transform 'difficult energy' in his audience. 'Some people are afraid, some people are laughing, some people maybe think it's bullshit – and this [happens] all together in this tiny corridor,' he told me. When Because The Knees Bend premiered at London's Southbank Centre in 2023, he says, responses ran the gamut from tears to aggression. One woman wrote to him afterwards to say the experience enabled her to process her own trauma. At Dark Mofo, he says, two people on opening weekend punched the walls until they bled. Asked why his work was presented without context, Setúbal says it would 'not be a real experience' for the audience if they knew what was coming, and what it meant: 'I think art can be a kind of experience, and we create our own sense about this experience, and maybe this can help us through something.' Some artwork benefits from a lack of context, others don't. It's a curator's job to gauge the intent of the artist and the opportunity of the artwork, anticipate the needs of the audience, then build the bridge that best connects them. When this works – when the art is good and the audience is engaged – the connection feels electric. When it doesn't, it feels, at best, like a missed opportunity. When the art is informed by trauma and a lived experience of oppression and violence, it can feel exploitative. Wandering around Dark Mofo, I wondered if the festival could adopt Mona's opt-in approach, where artwork is presented 'raw' but visitors can easily access more information via the O app. Mystery is easy; understanding is more elusive – but surely worth your best shot. Dark Mofo continues now and ends on 15 June, followed by the annual winter solstice swim on 21 June.
Sydney Morning Herald
10-06-2025
- Entertainment
- Sydney Morning Herald
A car crash and giant hand that looks like Donald Trump – Dark Mofo is back
Dropping to your knees and screaming at the top of your lungs in public is usually, at best, frowned upon – but here on a drizzly winter night I find myself considering it. Clearly there is something deep within each of us that wants to make our emotions heard by all around – babies and toddlers do it until societal conditioning teaches them to quieten down, to find new channels of expression, to live more interiorly. And so the screaming changes form; perhaps it turns into high blood pressure, into running marathons, into smashing out angry words anonymously on a keyboard. In his artwork Neon Anthem, however, Nicholas Galanin invites all who see his light-up sign to take a step back. 'I've composed a new national anthem,' the bright white words read. 'Take a knee and scream until you can't breathe.' The newest iteration of the work – minus the word 'American' before 'anthem' that has appeared in other versions – is on display as part of this year's Dark Mofo arts festival. The words loom large over a series of mats laid out on the floor, and all around me people are doing as asked; dropping to their knees and making themselves heard. New artistic director Chris Twite has had to wait a little longer than expected to helm his inaugural festival, but after hitting pause in 2024, Dark Mofo is back, with the Hobart-based arts festival bringing together visual art, music, performance and a series of experiences and experiments that don't fit neatly into a category. Perched atop one building is a giant hand with a face on it. 'It looks like Trump,' a friend insisted. 'No, it looks like Elon Musk,' another shot back. Actually, it's neither – Quasi by artist Ronnie van Hout is apparently a self-portrait of sorts. The last time I saw it was on its last day in Wellington, New Zealand – at the time, where the polarising work would be heading to next remained a mystery. 'Oh is that not normally there?' a passer-by says, attention drawn by all the people stopping to take photos. One of the key events of the first weekend of the festival was Crash Body, a work by artist Paula Garcia which saw two cars – one driven by a stunt driver and the other by the artist herself – collide after a series of increasingly tense near misses. To get to the event you needed to walk through Dark Park, a hub of different works including Neon Anthem, down a narrow pathway, past a car suspended by a crane, before trying to find a good vantage point in the crowd. Over the course of about half an hour, the two cars danced and wove around each other, sliding through puddles as the soundtrack amplified the tension. The crash itself came suddenly, much earlier than expected, the windows of both vehicles blowing out. 'Aggh I wasn't filming,' said a voice to the right of me. The voice's owner and the friends they came with left before seeing if Garcia had safely left her vehicle.
The Age
10-06-2025
- Entertainment
- The Age
A car crash and giant hand that looks like Donald Trump – Dark Mofo is back
Dropping to your knees and screaming at the top of your lungs in public is usually, at best, frowned upon – but here on a drizzly winter night I find myself considering it. Clearly there is something deep within each of us that wants to make our emotions heard by all around – babies and toddlers do it until societal conditioning teaches them to quieten down, to find new channels of expression, to live more interiorly. And so the screaming changes form; perhaps it turns into high blood pressure, into running marathons, into smashing out angry words anonymously on a keyboard. In his artwork Neon Anthem, however, Nicholas Galanin invites all who see his light-up sign to take a step back. 'I've composed a new national anthem,' the bright white words read. 'Take a knee and scream until you can't breathe.' The newest iteration of the work – minus the word 'American' before 'anthem' that has appeared in other versions – is on display as part of this year's Dark Mofo arts festival. The words loom large over a series of mats laid out on the floor, and all around me people are doing as asked; dropping to their knees and making themselves heard. New artistic director Chris Twite has had to wait a little longer than expected to helm his inaugural festival, but after hitting pause in 2024, Dark Mofo is back, with the Hobart-based arts festival bringing together visual art, music, performance and a series of experiences and experiments that don't fit neatly into a category. Perched atop one building is a giant hand with a face on it. 'It looks like Trump,' a friend insisted. 'No, it looks like Elon Musk,' another shot back. Actually, it's neither – Quasi by artist Ronnie van Hout is apparently a self-portrait of sorts. The last time I saw it was on its last day in Wellington, New Zealand – at the time, where the polarising work would be heading to next remained a mystery. 'Oh is that not normally there?' a passer-by says, attention drawn by all the people stopping to take photos. One of the key events of the first weekend of the festival was Crash Body, a work by artist Paula Garcia which saw two cars – one driven by a stunt driver and the other by the artist herself – collide after a series of increasingly tense near misses. To get to the event you needed to walk through Dark Park, a hub of different works including Neon Anthem, down a narrow pathway, past a car suspended by a crane, before trying to find a good vantage point in the crowd. Over the course of about half an hour, the two cars danced and wove around each other, sliding through puddles as the soundtrack amplified the tension. The crash itself came suddenly, much earlier than expected, the windows of both vehicles blowing out. 'Aggh I wasn't filming,' said a voice to the right of me. The voice's owner and the friends they came with left before seeing if Garcia had safely left her vehicle.
