Swiss-Italian multidisciplinary artist Massimo Furlan brings a new poetic and non-conformist performance to Milan. In Blue Tired Heroes, a group of “supermen seniors” roam the city to impose, in a series of tableaux as burlesque as they are delicate, the physical tests of ageing on this superhero figure trapped in his eternal youth… with “performer” inhabitants.

Superman was born in 1933. Since then, the character of Clark Kent has remained frozen in his eternal youth as a “superhero”, passing from one decade of glory to the next. But what if he finally assumed his true age? Wearing only pyjamas and blue trousers, red socks and a cape as accessories, Massimo Furlan answers the question by unleashing a strange commando of about fifteen elderly people from the city who take over the public space. Aged bodies and wrinkled faces shake our imagination to show, with humour, the evidence of the passage of time. Embodied by fifteen volunteer residents, these “tired blue heroes” play with humour and self-irony, their age and their image, which is far removed from the build of a bodybuilder.

In the continuum of a series of works experimented in the public space around the figure of Superman (Superman Cosmic Green, Love Story Superman), Blue Tired Heroes questions the notion of the heroic figure and the ghost of the superman accepted in the popular imagination, substituting a profoundly humanist incarnation of the passing of time. Funny, intense, tender, this extraordinary journey of ordinary men tells us a lot about the ability of the “superhero” to save the world, perhaps through a smile, a burst of laughter, a burlesque vision and a poetic and collective appropriation of public space?

in collaboration with Casa degli Artisti di Milano

itinerant urban performance

starting pointCasa degli Artisti di Milano – Via Tommaso da Cazzaniga, angolo, Corso Garibaldi, 89/A

Direction Massimo Furlan; Dramaturgy Claire de Ribaupierre; Costumes Severine Besson; Distribution and production Jérôme Pique; Administration Noémie Doutreleau; Production Numero23Prod.

After studying at the Ecole des Beaux-Arts in Lausanne, Swiss set designer and visual artist Massimo Furlan worked with various dance and theatre companies. In 2003, he founded his own company dedicated to the performing arts, Numéro23Prod., to question the act of representation outside the confines of genres. His multiple performances, essentially articulated around humour and contrast, question popular manifestations and the notion of the team, the themes of image, duration, childhood, memory and play.

photo ©Pierre Nydegger et Laure Cellier