The music video for Zolita’s new single “Holy” takes place in what the 21-year-old pop musician describes as a “patriarchal dystopian schoolhouse”. One of the students launches a rebellion alongside the girl she loves, starting a revolutionary anti-cult known as ‘The Cult of Girls’. “Given the recent political climate, I feel incredibly lucky to have made a video that covers the idea of escaping oppression, let alone embracing a same-sex relationship,” Zolita says.

The song comes from Zolita’s debut EP Immaculate Conception, a set of R&B-leaning songs exploring themes of female sexuality, spirituality, and feminism that the New York-based artist and filmmaker self-released last year. “I wrote ‘Holy’ from a place of unrequited love, which to me has always felt like a form of religion,” she says, “The concept of sacrificing yourself for who you love and apotheosizing that person is an idea I really resonate with.”

The clip for “Holy” was shot over a weekend in a historic schoolhouse and directed by Zolita herself with co-director Jake Saner. “I think music videos are the most impactful way to articulate an idea to a large group of people,” Zolita explains, “After I saw how my first music video ‘Explosion’ was able to establish a community based on one shared experience, I realized I needed to continue telling stories disenfranchised people could identify with, stories that would have resonated with me growing up.”

“The severity of the video’s conclusion was the most challenging to shoot, for everyone involved,” she adds, “But I knew it was thematically crucial because ultimately this is a story of a girl who sacrifices everything for what she believes in. In the end not only is she immortalized, but so are her ideas. She teaches the other girls something that transcends herself and ultimately plants the seed for further overthrow of an unjust system – and the birth of a cult of girls.”