Manualis in Vacuo

I looked into the practice of make up, where the face appears little by little such as into the practice of drawing, where one small line can unfold the entire idea: what if the stage could be a canvas and the body a logistic programme that operates its own illusion. Where is the border when illusion turns into your personal reality. What is needed to accomplish your illusion, what is needed to make the illusion fall a part whilest exercising it.
It became evident that nothing in this space could ever be taken for granted: all material and immaterial things needed to be asked: “ what are you (doing) here?”
The illusion is never granted, it needs to be actively produced. Everytime my illusion crumbled and fell apart, which became a working element for the practice itself, I needed to fix myself again.
In order to survive I needed to become a heroine. Or at least I needed to appear like one. An appearance that was indestructable but broken at the same time.
I will paint for you some faces. Being part of a ritual, they are survival tutorials that seek to overcome the fall into the void where existance is not a primary condition but an eventual occasion that contradicts its environment.
They are made out of a hysteria and deep sadness that occurs when the illusion fails to manifest, in the same moment they are heartbeats of new abilities to hope and dream about all what they might be.

credits:

concept, idea, development: Antonia Steffens
performance: Antonia Steffens, Emma Gioia, Laima Jaunzema, Elisa Zuppini, Keerthi Basavarajaiah, Laura van Bergem
text, costumes, sound edit: Antonia Steffens
music: ‘If there is something’, Roxy music
advice: Michele Rizzo
light and sound support: Maarten Jansen, Maureen Kreumrich
many thanks to : Michele Rizzo, Sndo3, Lisa Skwirblies, Susan Gibb, Rodrigo Sorbazo, Bojana Mladenovic, Maciej Sado, Marios Ktoridis, Keerthi, Elisa, Emma, Laima and Laura