2022

MYSTICS: Everything We Have Learned So Far

Studio Project

Experience DesignLive Visuals

MYSTICS is a new collaborative project by Jono Ma, Jonti and Babekühl; an experiment in sonic and visual world building and story-telling. A 1-hour cinematic live performance accompanied by an orchestra of synthesisers and a multidimensional light show. Blending the synth-driven sounds of the 1980’s and the VHS tapes that often housed them in cult cinema, MYSTICS is a tribute to the age of the analogue. MYSTICS debut live performance was at Carriageworks for Vivid Sydney, June 15, 2022.

MYSTICS debut - At Carriageworks as part of Vivid Sydney

Process

The Mystics project is an evolution of a performance Jono Ma, Jonti and Patrick Santamaria created in 2021 – an audiovisual show inspired by Ridley Scott’s 1982 film, Bladerunner.

During the conception of the Bladerunner show, we delved into a new process of sonic and visual world building, which we explored more deeply for the MYSTICS project. This process involves an intensive period where we immersed ourselves in a conceptual and creative feedback loop, with the babekuhl team creating moving images which Jono and Jonti responded to musically, and vice versa.

The resulting performance is something which we have no internal precedent for – it’s something between an ambient installation, a hyperdelic film and a rave. Cinematic post-rave. Techno-expressionism. Feel free to call it whatever you wish.