Antibodies

What kind of physical relationship exists between the bodies of the people moving through the Schirn Kunsthalle and the building as physical structure? This physical, material, body-to-body relationship, is what sparked my imagination.

The two bodies seemingly have very different evolutionary and existential timelines. The human body, dynamic and changeable, undergoes a continuous transformation and experiences decay much more rapidly than the architectural body, which appears more stable and subject to alterations only over considerably longer periods and through much greater forces. The most visible aspects of the interaction between these two bodies are primarily the traces left by human body decay —dust (mostly microscopic skin fragments), hair, external material brought in by shoes, clothing fibres, etc.— and the physical interaction between the human body and the building structure —traces on walls, stains, small scratches, signs of wear, etc.—

All these marks are regularly removed to maintain the building’s sameness, its integrity, as if there were a daily desire to restore the building to its immaculate integrity. From this paradoxical relationship emerges the idea of highlighting the normally invisible traces that result from the passage of many human bodies within the building.

The removal of human traces occurs through an almost sacred ritual that is both functional and symbolic. Its main elements are the maintenance of public contact surfaces, and the daily cleaning down to every microscopic element deposited inside the building as a result of the passage of visitors and staff. In this sense, the individuals devoted to these functions act as intermediaries between the human and the context that transcends and surrounds it.

The performance thus stems from the desire to emphasize this rituality by revealing all its most significant elements, which are ordinarily hidden from public view.

Some samples of the dust collected in the months before the performance were scanned at very high resolution and reproduced, with dramatic magnification, in the form of large colour posters on blue back paper. At the beginning of the performance, which was repeated for each of the three days of the event, a different poster was affixed to the wall and, at the end of the performance, covered by a black and white poster reproducing the glass of the scanner cleaned from dust (as much as it is possible).

The dust collected in the months before the performance, initially contained in a black bin liner, was poured onto the floor in front of the posters. To this was added the dust collected during the performance, at the end of which all the dust was placed back in the black bag, returning, cyclically, to the starting point. Each action of the cleaning team was announced by the sound of a foghorn.

Antibodies is the first public event to present the new body of work based on the collection and physical and digital representation of dust in public and private spaces.

Production: Schirn Kunshalle Frankfurt
Producer: Matthias Ulrich
Performers: Anton Andrienko, Leonie Englert, Luca Forcolini, Stasia Grishina, Florina Klubach, Max Pastuszewski, Paola Tinti
Collaboration with: Rosaria La Tona