“In the name of simple people, that poverty has maintained pure
In the name of the grace of the dark century
In the name of the scandalous revolutionary power of the past.”
Duration: ca. 70 Min. Choreography: Morgan Nardi Visual Art: Naoko Tanaka Dance: Anneliese Soglio, Francesco Pedone, Alessio Castellacci Music: Alex Goretzki Dramaturgy: Christoph Klimke Text: Heide Küsters (after Originals by P. P. Pasolini) Organisation: Martin Brüggemann Sponsored by: the Culture Bureau of Düsseldorf, the Art Foundation of North Rhine-Westphalia, the Prime Minister of North Rhine-Westphalia, Fonds Darstellende Künste e.V., Foundation Van Meeteren, Kunst- und Kulturstiftung der Stadtsparkasse Düsseldorf and the Italian Institut for Culture Köln.
THE STORY: Inspired by the life and works of the Italian writer and film director Pier Paolo Pasolini, the Ludica group of artists has created a multi-faceted staging between light and shadow, text fragments, sound compositions, cinematic quotes, abstract projections and choreographic elements. Ludica juggles with the principle of discontinuity and creates images and spaces with its own artistic signature and in an associative manner, with which they approach Pasolini’s notional cosmos. The title “Anmerkung 134” (“Note 134”) relates to the chapter “Anmerkung 133” (“Note 133”) in the novel “Petrolio”, which Pasolini was unable to complete due to his violent death.
PRESS
LUDICA – “ANMERKUNG 134”
Pier Paolo Pasolini was a citizen and revolutionary, poet and communist provocateur, catholic and heretic. For this Italian intellectual (1922 – 1975), who polemicised against left-wing Fascism, contradictions abounded. His death was never explained: A convicted male prostitute withdrew his confession. The suspicion that it was a contract killing by the Italian secret service was never dispelled. Such a figure existing between culture and subculture with his longing for an original society rooted in the earth and his homosexual desire aroused by looking at the backs of the knees of boys playing football, naturally inspired someone such as Johann Kresnik. In 1986, he wrote a “Testament of the body” on the body of Pasolini and celebrated obscene black masses. The Italian-Japanese art collective, Ludica, is much more sensitive in this regard. The choreographer and dancer Morgan Nardi and the space and video artist Naoko Tanaka are content with a respectful glance at the life and work of the film maker and writer. They collected splinters, astheticised and joined them to an image cosmos of beguiling visual art, dance, text and sound.
The audience pushed to the edge like the population of the Italian suburbs, to whom Pasolini devoted his critical social writings, is assigned the role of an extra by the artist duo. Ludica’s Performance “Anmerkung 134” refers to chapter 133 of the unfinished novel “Petrolio” (“petroleum”). This is not an addition, more of a rever-beration of a noisy artist existence. In the game with light and shadow, Annelise Soglio, Francesco Pedone and Alessio Castellacci dance Pasolini, raise their fists and, as black silhouettes, become an anti-capitalist threat of force on the masonry. In an animated projection, they amplify into the mass of people. The grungy homosexual sings an old Italian pop song with his black penis hanging out of his trousers. The intellectual explains his social, political positions in text fragments. The creature in him that requires the natural life form, crawls on all fours and gorges himself with food – clearly an allusion to the film “The 120 days of Sodom”. Some scenes are drawn out and many remain vague, literally in the dark. That is how it should be, Pasolini remained a myth.
THEY DANCE PASOLINI
Pier Paolo Pasolini – an avowed catholic who polemicized against the sexual morals of the church. A communist who denounced growing left-wing fascism. Homosexual, consumer critic, media sceptic. Radical in his positions and in his art, with which he evoked scandals, repeatedly quoted in court. Only he could no longer be prosecuted for his planned novel “Petrolio”. Pasolini was murdered in 1975, the text remained a fragment. He called his text passages “Notes” instead of “Chapters”; he had compiled 133 of them. Now there is one more. The Düsseldorf artist pair Ludica – consisting of Morgan Nardi (choreographer) and Naoko Tanaka (media artist) – has created a “Note 134”. This sounds like a continuation of the story but is, in fact, a very respectful homage. It was not only the agitator but the poet Pasolini that interested Ludica. Yet the escapades dominated the reception of the poet and film director to such an extent that he is now barely recognisable in this gentle approach. The three dancers of this evening strike at the floor, scratch over the surface with their fingernails – Pasolini, the rebel, who wished to destroy and rip up every smooth superficiality? Later men and women crawl on all fours, have food thrown at them, which they devour like animals – perhaps a film reminiscence of “The 120 Days of Sodom”? And at some point, the three performers of the evening lean naked against a wall, posing as if for mythologically stylised nude photography. Pasolini, the lover of simple creatureliness?
Nardi and Tanaka arrange vestiges of his life, his art, so highly aesthetic and, at the same time, calculated to be so imperfect, that the images could never be kitschy. Yet you remain unsettled, understanding at some point that these are only your own projections in which you believe to have discovered Pasolini. The Ludica formation is an expert in dreamlike ramifications. They thoroughly conceive each and every one of their images. So their pieces are never flat just illegible in parts – but somehow, after all, this suits the literary monstrosity that is “Petrolio".