curated by Ilaria Mancia
“What the caterpillar calls the end of the world,
the rest of the world calls a butterfly.” (Lao Tzu)
The apparitions of re – creatures in the Pelanda and the outdoor spaces of Mattatoio define, during summertime, a pathway in which animal creatures of various shapes and sizes play the leading roles. This return of the animals to the Mattatoio has been conceived as an imaginary emancipation marked by an ambivalence merging drama with irony. The various artworks occupying the spaces address the issue of animalness in different ways and are open to various different levels of interpretation and perception. This animal presence, midway between domestic confinement and an unveiling of their wilder side, is disturbing precisely because it is at once reassuring and threatening.
The different spaces, with their intriguing beauty that makes no attempt to hide the place's bloody history, are going to be inhabited, subtly invaded, by fragile yet undaunted chimera-like creatures. Presences that force us to face the basic amibiguity of our relationship with the environment which consisting as much of wonderfully vibrant exchanges as it does of devastating, irreparable violence. Maybe the animals can help us to re-invent that relationship, or maybe they can just allow us to feel that it is temporarily suspended as it tends towards an (im)possible future.
The apparitions that make up the re – creatures programme take up a stance in opposition to any appearance but they do so in the awareness that it is precisely the tangled relationship between an apparition and an appearance that determines the dreamlike slide in which the logic of human thought opens up, possibly for only a moment and thanks to artistic creation, to the perception of other habitats.
“In Sparta boys were wolves; in Athens girls were bears. Text books repeat that the youths' initiation served to introduce them to the order of the city. But the opposite is true. It was in actual fact a way of looking towards a point in the past, towards a state of mingling with animals from which man had broken away, first becoming a wolf or a bear, then becoming the one who slew wolves and bears. Initiation was an invitation to remember. One day, at a given age, they would study history. For now they discovered what happened before all history: they became wolves and bears for a short while.” (Roberto Calasso)
These apparitions are going to have different levels of intensity throughout the summer.
At the end of June we will be setting out on a journey into darkness where we will meet creatures that build sound landscapes through their bodies, the photographic medium, music and words.
At the end of July the human and the non-human will complete a fantastic twilight occupation of the outdoor spaces. Also, new movements of live performances will stage worlds that dialogue with reality in unexpected ways, through language, the body, matter and the relationships forged with the surrounding environment.
The interior of the Pelanda will be "inhabited" by animal creatures: three large video installations will immerse human guests in dystopian and alienating worlds in which animalness prompts a reflection on our condition.
