Guillaume Coutu Dumont & Line Katcho^CA/QC

Photo credit: Jean-François Brière

Guillaume Coutu Dumont's prolific career spans multiple musical groups, influences and countries. Originally a student of electroacoustics and Latin and classical percussion, Coutu Dumont entered the Montréal techno and microhouse scene in the early 2000’s with groups such as EGG, Chic Miniature and LUCI, before heading to Paris and Berlin. The years spent abroad saw him play and tour extensively as Guillaume & The Coutu Dumonts or as Guillaume & the Side Effects (a five piece band) and produce records as MUSEUM or The Per Eckbo Orchestra. Back in Montréal a decade later, he reignited Flabbergast with Vincent Lemieux, released an EP under the moniker Vieux Renard and launched Auflassen, a trio of live drums, keyboards and electronics.

Line Katcho is a composer and new media artist from Montréal. Primarily interested in sound and image as demonstrations of motion, forces or gestures, she also distinguishes herself through an affinity with perceptual games, and a talent for use of affect. Radiating a narrative and cinematic feel, her work is driven and provocative, fusing reference to abstraction, experimentation to tradition. Leaning towards a mixing of styles, genres and applied methods, her versatile approach aims to create a sensory and cathartic experience, rooted in expression and authenticity.

Guillaume Coutu Dumont & Line Katcho — Les Empires

Inspired by Krautrock veterans Manuel Göttsching and Tangerine Dream and more recently by artists like Alessandro Cortini or Caterina Barbieri, Guillaume Coutu Dumont composes retro-futuristic pieces full of warmth and imperfections, typical of the ambient synthetic sounds of another era.

Soft percussion and repetitive melodies create a hypnotic and nostalgic atmosphere reminiscent of an age that may never have existed. Les Empires, is a synth heavy piece inspired by science fiction and mythology presented at MUTEK Montreal, for the first time, with uniquely tailored visuals by artist Line Katcho.

In a surreal odyssey, Katcho depicts the cyclical nature of power, decay, and rebirth through the lens of imaginary empires that never existed. Merging abstract visuals, symbolism and fractured narrative threads, she conjures a dreamlike tapestry where towering monoliths dissolve into sand and rulers morph into their own monuments. A shifting mirage of power structures rising and crumbling in eternal loops, echoing forgotten pasts and fabricated futures. Time bends, history blurs, and the viewer is left navigating the psychological remains of ambition and entropy.