Invicta

Performance

With Giulio Maulini

2019

Video

The performance is comprised of a victory device that gets activated every time the door opens, allowing entrance to one visitor at a time.
Everyone can win simply by entering.
Every time the performance restarts from scratch, and for a few moments the visitor is the main focus of attention while being cheered with applause, yells, confetti and a toast.
Every time a bottle is uncorked as in a big sports competition and to the winning visitors, that is all of them, a medal is awarded and a photo on the podium is taken.
At the end the mechanism restarts and another person will win again.
As the medal board is emptied out, another one with all the winners' pictures gets filled.
The need to win, because of its intrinsic connection to our survival instinct (mors tua vita mea), has been typical of mankind since the mists of time, as is certified by the most ancient petroglyphs.
The theme of the struggle to arrive to victory was present in the oldest mythological stories, both sacred and epic, from the Gilgamesh and the Homeric Poems to the most ancient prayers, where one of the most common topics was the request of aid to achieve victory.
In this view victory itself was identified with a divinity: Athena Nike, Sol Invictus. The Italian National Anthem, in reference to its basic themes, asks: “Where is the victory?”.
The need for acknowledgement is therefore a primary one which originates the need to excel and to win over all fellow human beings, and in so doing it meets basic primordial needs, feeds and satisfies the ego, and awakes addictions.
The minute of glory that this work gifts doesn't require any other effort apart from being there.
What remains then, apart from the unwon medals and the pictures of the winners, is the result of a frenetic party, a space that is crumpled, used and melancholically dripping a euphoric aftermath.

Video documentation: Alice Invernici

Photographer: Silvia Bramati

Performer: Ilaria Invernici, Marcello Maulini, Invan Clerici, Erik Piana, Paolo Racis

Installation view at Spazio Giacomq