EXTRA FOCUS

show | duration 80 min

c/o ZONA K, admission allowed with membership 2024

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A theatrical fiction on citizenship rights that tells the story of the transition from adolescence to adulthood of a second-generation girl grappling with the construction of her identity, conflict with her family and her relationship with her origins, and the obstacles caused by missed citizenship rights in school life and in the world of sport. The story focuses on a pivotal moment in the protagonist’s life: her turning 18, and sees her coming to terms with the desires, expectations and renunciations that this ‘milestone’ brings to her existence. The show talks about school, the relationship between generations, education, privileges acquired by birth and rights denied by law. The adolescent characters are played by girls and boys met along the production route, while adult actors and actresses represent the family and the educating community. The show marks the culmination of three years of work by the Guinea Pigs Performing Arts Laboratory with groups of teenagers in Milan and Lombardy. Every aspect of the creative process is conceived, written in collaboration, and in dialogue with the working group: a collective and transgenerational creation process where each participant finds a space for storytelling, action, and representation. L’Italia è relativa also wants to be an opportunity to reflect on the unconscious privilege that concerns a large part of the population that is already Italian and to publicly question ourselves on what is the society we are imagining or are consciously deciding not to imagine.

a performance by Giulia Tollis and Riccardo Mallus with Letizia Bravi, Ivna Lamart, Marco De Francesca and a cast of adolescents still to be defined dramaturgy Giulia Tollis direction Riccardo Mallus and Mohamed Boughanmi Rengifo video Julian Soardi set design Stefano Zullo with the collaboration of Ilenia Mia Carrozzo, Giovanni Di Ponziano, Anna Simon Hanna production Laboratorio d’Arte Performativa Guinea Pigs with the support of MiC and SIAE in the framework of the programme “Per Chi Crea“, and ZONA K, Industria Scenica, Ilinxarium multidisciplinary artistic residence, Casa degli Artisti (Milan), Compagnia Carnevale, Barrio’s Cultural Centre

Photo by the artist

Laboratorio d’Arte Performativa Guinea Pigs creates performances, installations, events, and cultural experiences that investigate social issues in theatrical spaces and urban contexts and are the result of meetings and collaborations with third parties operating in the social field and other artistic disciplines. In 2022 the company, together with the publishing house Marcos Y Marcos and the Arci Post club in Parma, planned and realised a cycle of digital and live events to promote the fruition and diffusion of poetry as part of the project Atlante Sonoro della Poesia Mondiale (Sound Atlas of World Poetry) financed by the Fondazione Cariparma.