Decade of Dark Mofo marked by $5.5m generated at festival box office, 427,000 entries at venues
Lovers of the night have helped ring in a decade of Dark Mofo, with more than $5m in tickets generated for outgoing creative director Leigh Carmichael’s final festival. Festival figures revealed >
Tasmania
Don't miss out on the headlines from Tasmania. Followed categories will be added to My News.
Lovers of the night have helped ring in a decade of Dark Mofo, with more than $5m in tickets generated for outgoing creative director Leigh Carmichael’s final festival.
The festival set new attendance records for the 14-day festival, which showcased 400 artists, across 65 events at 35 venues across the city.
A total of 427,000 entries were counted at festival venues overall, with more than 100,000 tickets sold – generating $5.5m at the festival box office.
A total of 65 per cent of tickets were snapped up by interstate buyers.
The ever-popular Winter Feast exceeded 110,000 entries across the two weeks – with almost 20,000 showing up on the final Sunday night.
More than 15,000 tickets were purchased by late-night partygoers who flocked to Night Mass: Exstasia.
Outgoing creative director Leigh Carmichael said he had mixed emotions as he prepared to step aside from the festival.
He said due to the support of the state government and City of Hobart, and the generosity of David Walsh, they had created something “truly special” over the past decade.
“The community spirit that is evident everywhere throughout the city during the festival is quite remarkable,” Mr Carmichael said.
“I would like to take this opportunity to express my deep appreciation for the thousands of staff, artists, contractors and stallholders who have worked tirelessly to bring the event to life each and every year, and of course I’m forever grateful to the people of Tasmania for their support, participation and patience.
“While my time curating the festival is now over, I’m entirely confident that it will continue to captivate and inspire audiences in the years to come under the direction of incoming Artistic Director Chris Twite.”
The Mercury in 2022 reported that year’s festival recorded 300,000 visits at festival venues across the two-week period.
DarkLab marketing and business director Drew Berridge said while the 2023 festival’s programming had been ambitious, they felt “truly overwhelmed” by the response.
“There is always nervous energy within our team when taking the creative risks that we do, but we’re feeling a huge sense of achievement, seeing just how many people have come out to celebrate our dark nights together,” he said.
By the numbers – Dark Mofo 2023:
> Number of years – 10
> 400 artists
> 65 events
> 35 venues
> 100,000+ tickets sold
> $5.5m generated at the festival box office
> 427,000 entries
> 110,000 entries at Winter Feast
> 15,000 Night Mass tickets sold
> 17,500 attendees for Ogoh-Ogoh procession and The Burning
> 90,000 entries at Dark Park
> 20,000 entries for Silent Symphony
> 2,000 Nude Solstice swimmers
More Coverage
Originally published as Decade of Dark Mofo marked by $5.5m generated at festival box office, 427,000 entries at venues
Stand by your man: Premier backs embattled Minister
Despite a looming no confidence motion over the handling of T-T Line and TasPorts, Michael Ferguson still has the support of the Premier, who backed him in this morning. Here’s what was said.
Loggers’ year-long discrimination case dismissed
A 16-month long discrimination case filed by logging supporters against the Bob Brown Foundation has been dismissed. What the anti-discrimination commissioner had to say.