Finissage Friday, April 20, at 6.30 pm
with the presentation of On Social Metamorphosis,
a new video by Luigi Coppola
introduced by a conversation between the artist and Matteo Lucchetti
On the last week of Enacting Populism in its Mediæscape, the new video by Luigi Coppola, which is the last part of his performative work On Social Metamorphosis, will be presented in the frame of a conversation between the artist and Matteo Lucchetti, curator of the show. On this last public event in the parallel program of the project, the video is included in the exhibition, right when the life of this sui generis political bureau comes to an end. With this proposition where an emancipative aspect of the populist dynamic is analysed, the Enacting Populist closes, making a last statement around the idea of the ‘transformation of myths’ in the populist zeitgeist.
On Social Metamorphosis amplifies and feeds the echoes of current changes in society.Based on the principle that social claims must invent their own language in order to be heard, Luigi Coppola works with performers to produce a choral manifesto: artists, singers and comedians lend their voices and gestures to this utopian endeavor.
Luigi Coppola creates resonances between the ancestral Greek choir and what he calls the “virtual choir”. Paul Jorion, a financial chronicler, was chosen as a representative model of citizens’ implication in politics; his blog is the starting point for the text of this performance.
This blog is one of the most influential and popular platforms for discussions and proposals on the theme of the present economic, political and social crisis in Europe. Paul Jorion and his team call for ideas from which to formulate the founding principles of a new society, breaking with today’s which is in indefinite crisis. Paul Jorion invites past and present intellects to his think-tank. The performance mingles quotations from the French revolutionary Louis Antoine de St Just, the British economist John Maynard Keynes and the American statesman Franklin Roosevelt. These are chanted by the choir in between Paul Jorion’s recent declarations and quotes from committed bloggers.“Revolt struggles to find its voice” notices Luigi Coppola who suggests the mask as a symbol of union and protest. Conceived by the artist using pages from financial newspapers, the masks encourage the people to speak out.
In On Social Metamorphosis, faces are not hidden, so they recognize each other; the mask procures them the power of the multitude.
