The flag is an object that has always expressed a sense of belonging or separation and marks the distinction between hypothetical “us” and “them”. The shroud is a funerary cloth that marks the boundary between the living and the dead. Two textile objects bound by an ancient kinship evoked by Ginevra Panzetti’s and Enrico Ticconi’s work.
The artistic duo living and working between Turin and Berlin, moving between dance, performance and visual art, brings to Rovereto a double performance on the theme of power through the virtuosity of flag-waving: A E R E A and Silver Veiled.
In A E R E A, the two artists are on stage, emerging from the dark together with flags cleared of emblems or symbols and forming one single anatomy with the objects. Silver Veiled is a video work created with the research material of the diptych of which A E R E A is a part. Here the flag sketches a score of unveilings, which underlines the profound relationship with a shroud.
In both works, the colour of the cloths is silver grey and this shows them as they are and allows their plasticity to emerge. There is only one symbol that stands out: the beak of a parrot, an animal that repeats words and sentences ignoring their meaning or consequences. And it is the movement that tells us about the blind dynamics of power, the vainglorious character of wars and the rigour of military deployments.
Ginevra Panzetti’s and Enrico Ticconi’s movement nails its presence on stage and declares itself to be a “thing to watch”, unthinkable outside this condition.