In July 2021, GHOST travelled to Italy together with Voo?uit for the Santarcangelo arts festival. A host of Belgian artists spent a week in the mini-state of Mutonia, just next to Santarcangelo. Mutonia looked straight out of ‘Mad Max’ (1979), the post-apocalyptic cult film that launched the career of a young Mel Gibson.

On location, the travelling artists played two sold-out shows, with performances by ANKKH, Mathijs Steels (Shht), Lotta Mächs, STAKE and Reisac & Jiheavy. Director of photography Jeroen De Wilde and documentary filmmaker Julie Daems created a visual report of the trip and shows. The result of this ‘Mad Max’-inspired Italo-Belgian crossover can be seen at Voo?uit on Friday 22 October as part of VIDEODROOM!

STAKE

Over a decade ago, four youngsters-barely 12 years, started making music in a shabby rehearsal room, somewhere in Flanders’ Fields. The music was LOUD, and hard, uncompromising, tantalizing. In 2021, STAKE still produces hyper atmospheric grunge core, or perhaps post metal oriented melodic sludge. Together with these four post-metalheads GHOST traveled to Italy where Mutonia formed the backdrop for a video clip directed and filmed by DOP Jeroen De Wilde.

Julie Daems (regie) & Zaur Kourazov (DOP) – ‘Carol’s Channel’

In this quirky behind the scenes we meet Carol, a woman who lives in Mutonia. A murderous ghost emerges from the old colour television that she operates by hand. We find ourselves in a confusing trip between the different TV channels that casts a new light and also a darkness on the intentions of Stefan Bracke and his companions. The night shows a looming moon and to the heavy chords of a false piano and deep drone beats, a paranormal dog explores the apocalyptic village. Will everyone survive this night?

Julie Daems is a young filmmaker who explores the boundary between documentary and fiction and plays on it in an imaginative way. She graduated from KASK with the short film ‘L’Indigotier’ (2020). Together with her regular cameraman and filmmaker Zaur Kourazov (‘Time Is’, 2019), they travelled to make a playful audio-visual document of the musical spectacle of GHOST in Santarcangelo.

Jeroen De Wilde: STAKE music video

Director / DOP Jeroen De Wilde was inspired by the mini-free state of Mutonia for the creation of this STAKE music video. The quirky hometown of collected scrap and self-transformed vehicles provides the ideal backdrop for the clip starring Carol, who sets out in a post-apocalyptic (and ‘Mad Max’-inspired) world in search of a ‘fusion cell’ to get life back on track.

Reisac. ft. Jiheavy

This industrial collaboration between Joris Casier (STAKE) and Stefan Bracke brings an ode to new beat.

Mathijs Steels (Shht)

You can safely call the keyboardist of, among others, Shht and Soapstarter a virtuoso. During our GHOST: The ‘Mad Max’ edition, he takes on the role of a dark pianist who has fallen into disrepair.

Lotta Mächs

Lotta likes to float around in a room full of vhs tapes, old school video mixers and crappy tv-monitors. searching for ultimate moments that give her the thrill she is looking for in this analogue chaos. it can result in live visuals or video-collages, the process may or may not be extended by immortalizing her video stills in warm, meaningful painted abstraction. Lotta also stars as protagonist Carol in the STAKE clip by Jeroen De Wilde.

ANKKH

ANKKH is an Italian visual artists duo, made up of Kristofer and Ektor, performers and DJ’s. They form a strong artistic identity inspired by different subcultures such as cyberpunk and hyper pop. They combine their art with sound and transformations, especially those related to the queer culture of which hey are a part. Their art is an expression between the digital and the spiritual dimension. Afterwards ANKKH will be performing a DJ set at the Voo?uit Café.

Mutonia & The Mutoids

Either way you look at it, Mutonia is the place it’s all about. Located near the Italian town of Santarcangelo Di Romagna, it can be described as a peculiar “village within a village”, a temporary city that has been transformed over time in response to the larger urban, territorial and social context. Mutonia was born from the anarchic, iconoclastic and experimental spirit of the travellers and cyberpunks.

Unfortunately, this quirky hometown, made up of collected scrap metal and self-transformed vehicles, is in danger of extinction. Regulations fall short to give the people who live here a legal leg to stand on. Several years ago, a council decision asked the residents of Mutonia to dismantle and restore their site to the state it was 25 years ago. Since then, the Mutoids have been doing everything they can to defend themselves and keep their hometown, their motherland.

PRACTICAL

Fri 22.10 – 19:30 (doors) / 20:00 (start) & 22:00 (doors) / 22:30 (start) Theaterzaal De Vooruit
MUSIC / rock / electronica / film
€18 / 15 (presale)
90 min.