FRAGILE IN VENICE - Performance

Public Performance/Action/ Participatory Art

Curated by Tina B
In collaboration with Fondazione Buziol and the fashion School at IUAV University in Treviso.
November 5, 2010
Venice, Italy





“FRAGILE ” is the title of a series of public performances/actions, which combines art and fashion by using the medium of the body, sign and paper with the conscious attempt to create situations where new ideas and possibilities can unfold and stimulate thought. It celebrates beauty and autonomy and at the same time charges with meaning the public space of the city of Venice and addresses the meaning of the word FRAGILE as the most relevant condition in our culture.
The primary material, medium is the body of 80 participants (boys and girls), who call themselves FRAGILE people, who are dressed in A shaped dress wear made out of colorful recycle paper designed and produced by the artist especially for this project. Each paper dress is conceived by the artist as an alternative cultural marker and for this reason is bearing the word FRAGILE as a cut out. Through the performance the human presence and fashion function as a symbol, a storyteller or/and entertainer; the body interacts with the space to create an experience or a situation, which triggers bodily and cognitive responses.
FRAGILE calls into our mind the disposable pop paper fashion of the 60’s in US and Europe as well as the “parangoles” of Helio Oiticica the Brazilian artist of the 60’s which were dresses designed to be worn by the public during public events in order to create a space of liberation and to provoke actions during animated walking or demonstration.

ROUTE

The trail of the performance/ action FRAGILE has been determined by the artist and it is based on the trail that Ralph Runmey (the only English situations) undertook in Venice with the goal of intensifying the experience of certain neighborhoods and sites in Venice, and the relationship of urban architecture and the human body.

ITINERARY

The performance is by foot and in a group of 80 participants and the whole journey is planned to last for three to four hours. Through a series of repetitive and non-hierarchical walks and gestures which the artists calls “protest” each participant becomes an agent who understands urban space and time as an autonomous field.
The starting point of the performance is Fondazion Buziol, which is established in the Venetian Palazzo Mangilli-Valmarana facing the Grand Canal where all participants meet, sign in and get dressed in FRAGILE.

FRAGILE from Foundation Buziol at Strada Nova moves through to Campo di Ghetto Nuovo; then to Campo St Leonardo; and via vaporeto to Canale Grande to Rialto; cross Ponte Rialto and walk through Merkato to Ponte Accademia; cross to Academia and then via vaporeto to Canale Grande and Canale di San Marco; go to Campo Arsenale; from Arsenale walk through Piazza San Marco and back to Foundation Buziol at Strada Nova by Canale Grande.

OBJECTIVES FOR A CITY LIKE VENICE

The challenge presented is in this technological era to create a body capable of becoming the precarious space for concepts, which materializes itself while weaving the concrete and at the same time FRAGILE thread of life.

It is very important that FRAGILE takes place in such a city as Venice a city with rich and dynamic cultural practices, intellectual circuits, architecture and social institutions and offers to all participants of FRAGILE a novel form for expression, experimentation and research. FRAGILE seeks to bring a diverse public together into a playful and transgressive way, which opens numerous possibilities to reveal another way of discovering the “fragile” city of Venice through a sense of physical liberation.

FRAGILE seeks to create a space where civic freedom, individuality and agency can re-write the canon in the urban landscape.

Wearing FRAGILE is creating wonder, joy and other playfully stimulating experiences as a tool that can be used to break down barriers, to explore processes for new interactions, communication and practices in the city.

The objectives of FRAGILE is through our ability to perform publicly to exercise our power to create and to collect signals and to send messages as we all work together towards the same performative action.

As we perform we feel this matters because we live in a FRAGILE society.

As we perform we express in our own style and choice our FRAGILE U and we use our body in motion.

As we perform we try to keep our FRAGILE dress charged with meaning but as intact as possible.

As we perform we are taking into account the physical challenge, which each paper dress presents because FRAGILE is designed to be ephemeral, fragile, humble and poetic in nature. The most destructive elements are liquid, fire and violence.

NOTES

FRAGILE will be documented on video and photos from beginning to end and it will be posted along with the photographs of each participants along with his/her comments at my website and Foundation Buziol.

FRAGILE can be seen as a documentary video at the Fondazion Buziol during Tina B Festival in
Venice.