To write this text, I chose the photo documentation of the performance “Grávida 2001” by Nathalie S. Fari, carried out beginning of 1999. Unconsciously, I made this choice to find a smoother way to get in touch with the artwork, without having to renew my first impressions, which remained in my memory as something inexplicably agonising.

So, in the first image I could see a close-up of the artist, facing a transparent sphere stuck to her abdomen. Even though it’s far-fetched, the image is dramatic: the woman looking at a kind of external womb, disappointed that it’s empty; an even predictable projection of sterility in the future, a world where feelings are massacred by artificial intelligence. In another image one could see that the performer wasn’t looking at the transparent sphere and that, instead of a disillusioned expression, she had an apathetic look that cast doubt on her own humanity. And, from a more distant angle, it becomes clear that the performer is half-naked, with her legs open, her sex exposed and, on a silver, gynaecological chair. An archetypical image that is blurred by the fact that she’s looking nowhere, devoid of any sensuality, grace or even the dramatic tone inherent in such a vulnerable female figure.

In fact, the photographic perspective revealed a strange distortion, from which closer references such as theatre and painting transformed the performance into an allegorical fiction and thus, radicalized the artwork, which in addition to a visual idea, brought forward the attitude of the artist.

(Rafael Vogt Maia Rosa, “Testemunho de um Movimento no Caos” (En: Witnessing a Movement in Caos), 1999, my translation.

Event Dates: 27.03.1999, Opening of the exhibition “No Man Is an Island”, Atelier Livre Patrícia Naka & friends, São Paulo, BR

Credits: Photos: Tatti Vitorino (Spectator: Rafael Vogt Maia Rosa)