‘Manageable Matter: Maces I—IX’ explores ideas of gravity and grace through different sculptural variations of glass artichoke hearts—closed, in the process of blossoming, and in full bloom. Combined with silicone, metal, wood and light elements, these forms will be embraced by club-like stems; beginning as medieval clubs, drum major maces will transform, branch and ramify, to become elongated driftwood sticks. These figures will continue to grow and evolve into phantom limbs of bleached coral that develop a fluorescent luminosity before they die. The result will be massive, yet mutable, flexible prostheses that will be used as performative objects for a series of events on the theme of ‘Optimistic Incrementalism’— ‘incrementalism’ refers to a strategy of action characterized by trial and failure, expansion, and improvement.

The series of medieval, parliamentary, and ceremonial maces explore a conflation between Ciro “The Artichoke King” Terranova (July 1988—February 20, 1938) who was a mobster who dominated the artichoke trade in America; the play, “The Resistible Rise of Arturo UI” by Bertolt Brecht, which is a detailed analysis of the economic and psychological roots of fascism that is based on the above story (although artichokes were exchanged for cauliflower); and “Glitch Feminism: a manifesto”, by Legacy Russell (Verso books, 2020).

The nine forms will be contrasted by the dynamism of nine performers’ gestures, to explore the friction between response and reaction. Combined with the recent speculative score ‘Shifting Tethers or How to Conduct a Flustered Symphony‘—that will serve as a print on dance floor as scenography for this study, the working process will culminate in a ‘hyper-glitch’ opera as a time-based installation, and will be further adapted for the medium of film.

Credits

• Blacksmith: Bartholomäus Kinner & sons
• Glass Assistance: William Faulkner, Berlin Glas e.V.
• Silicone Assistance: Caterina Veronesi
• Performers: NINE + 1
• Composer: Jacob Stoy
• Dramaturg : Maire Glassl