08.05, 30.05.2020

cancelled

Rossella Biscotti Molfetta / Rotterdam/Brussels

The Journey

visual arts / performance — premiere

Mediterranean Sea

The Journey is a performance of a ship navigating a GPS content-related route inspired by time, history and current geopolitical data researched together with different experts and communities in an area of the Mediterranean Sea between Italy, Malta, Tunisia, Libya. The narrative is centered on the decision and consequences of dropping a 20-ton marble block awarded to the artist by the iconic Michelangelo quarry in Carrara, Italy, yet left untouched. In fact, Rossella Biscotti uses the block as a mechanism to unpack the political, economic and environmental layers of a complex body of water. The point of departure is the island of Malta, a country located in between Europe and Africa, and a collection of maps showing different information comprising data on shipwrecks, cabling, military checks, licenses for energy and oil companies in the deadliest migration route of the Mediterranean Sea. This artistic gesture will take place between the 8th and the 30th of May, depending on the weather conditions, and in collaboration with the ship’s crew, a poet and a composer. Thus, it will be the only invisible performance at the festival, echoing the hidden nature of what is going on in the Mediterranean. The Journey will become a layered sound composition, that will be presented in 2021, exposing the politics of visibility and invisibility, off-shore exploration and exploitation.

Artist: Rossella Biscotti

Narrative voice: Quinn Latimer

Field recording and sound composition: Attila Faravelli

Project developed with Blitz Valletta and in collaboration with: Sara Dolfi Agostini

(curator at Blitz Valletta, Malta), Timmy Gambin (Associate Professor of Maritime

Archaeology, University of Malta), Joseph Meli (director of the Research & Training

Centre of MaritimeMT, Malta), Lewis Baldacchino (Port Logistics Operations Ltd,

Malta), Albert Gambina, Marine Pilot (Malta Maritime Pilots), Elman srl, Pomezia

(Rome), Maritime Research Institute Netherlands (Rotterdam), Cave Michelangelo

(Carrara)

Coproduction: Kunstenfestivaldesarts

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