‘It’s nice to be back’: Dark Mofo turns heads with stunning crowds

Festival organisers had hoped to see a return to pre-Covid crowd levels in 2022 – now the numbers are in. See how many showed up >>

Dark Mofo crowds this month reached 94 per cent of pre-Covid levels, with organisers confident the festival will have a long-term place on the state’s cultural calendar.

The 2022 instalment of the midwinter festival ran over two weeks with 45 ticketed performances and several major free events, with more than 300,000 visits counted at festival venues.

The figure almost matched the 320,000 entrants at the 2019 festival, with the final night of Winter Feast (23,000 people) and the Ogoh-ogoh Burning (13,000) this year’s two most popular drawcards.

Dark Mofo marketing and business director Drew Berridge said the “bold decision” to open the festival with 18-year-old hip-hop/rap artist The Kid Laroi had paid off in spades, with more than 5200 buying tickets to attend his concert at MyState Bank arena.

The Kid Laroi had MyState Bank Arena rocking on the opening night at Dark Mofo 2022. Picture: Aiesha Hanson

It was the festival’s “single most successful ticketed event to date”, Mr Berridge said.

“The support that the local community and interstate visitors have shown has meant so much to all of the hardworking staff at Dark Mofo, and encourages us to move forward next year with renewed enthusiasm,” he said.

“This year has been quite the resurrection.”

Creative director Leigh Carmichael, who earlier this month said he was “exhausted” and considering bowing out after the 2023 festival, did not comment on his future plans but said he was “pleased with the results” of this year’s edition.

“After surviving a challenging period, it’s nice to be back,” Mr Carmichael said.

“This year we endured some uncertainty around Covid-related restrictions during planning, venue shortages, some staffing hurdles, and changes to programming with artists cancelling travel due to ill-health.”

“Somehow we managed to navigate all that and it’s a relief that the festival was able to be presented in full again.

“We thank the Tasmanian government, Hobart City Council, all our key supporters and suppliers, all those who painted the town red, and most importantly our community, for having patience with us during the past few weeks.”

About 5000 people joined the festival’s opening Reclamation Walk, up from 3000 in 2021. Picture: Remi Chauvin

Interstate visitors snapped up 65 per cent of all ticket sales, as Small Business Minister Madeleine Ogilvie lauded the festival “another success story for our economy”.

“The government has been a supporter of Dark Mofo since its inception in 2013, and we are proud to have supported it again in 2022, providing $3 million to help deliver this year’s event,” Ms Ogilvie said.

“This level of commitment acknowledges the event has grown to be one of the state’s most popular annual offerings and cements Dark Mofo as one of Tasmania’s premier cultural festivals.”

Work needed to be done to ease the venue constraints of this year’s festival but the creative uses of new spaces including the Melville St precinct were a positive, Ms Ogilvie said.

“We’re really aware of that (venue shortages) … we’re looking at more that we can do across the arts and cultural sites, particularly the waterfront areas.”

The Burning of the Ogoh-ogoh, Olivia the Masked Owl. Picture: Linda Higginson

DARK MOFO BY THE NUMBERS

300,000 general entries counted to festival events

$3.5m in revenue generated from 72,000 tickets sold

65 per cent of tickets were purchased by interstate visitors

More than2000 nudists took the icy plunge for the solstice swim.

23,000 visited Hiromi Tango’s Rainbow Dream: Moon Rainbow installation.

5000 participated in the Reclamation Walk to open the festival.

13,000 witnessed the parade and burning of Ogoh-ogoh, the giant Tasmanian masked owl.

$130,600 raised for selected charity Voices for Children to assist Ukrainian children and families.