Sarah Revoltella

Born in 1971 in Geneva (Switzerland)
Lives and works in Venice (Italy)

The performance Io Combatto ("I Fight") arises from the idea that the artist can flip the destructive function of weapons by destroying weapons in turn. The “object” that has been created with the purpose of destroying the life of men reveals itself at the end to be an empty crock, broken and unusable as the wreckage of houses, villages, environments which remain the only evidence, the only "survivors" of bombings. Breaking weapons into a thousand pieces symbolically evokes the madness that results from the ephemeral act of killing and destroying “for its own sake”. The work starts with the ceramic exact replica of a number of weapons that are used in contemporary wars (machine guns, pistols, mines, rifles, etc.). The artist, with the help of experienced potters, created this small arsenal. The performance consists then of the exhibition of weapons to the public: each weapon is illustrated and explained in detail in all its specific and lethal characteristics. During the second part of the performance, the weapons are destroyed by the artist who creates a sort of "symbolic bombing" where the weapons, and not mankind, are the objects of destruction. The broken pieces that remain on the ground form the final work. At the end of the performance, the only visible ruins are formed by the weapons themselves, that will operate a symbolic “upside down” of the "natural” purpose they were created for. Eventually the broken pieces are installed / planted like flowers in a meadow.

Video documentation of Sarah Revoltella’s Io Combatto will be reshown at KB17. The original simultaneous performance was curated by Olga Gambari and made in collaboration with Terzo Paradiso, the foundation Pistoletto and the support of Veneto Region, the municipality of Nova, the Department of Culture of the Municipality of Nova, Vicenza province and the city of Venice. The performance artists were: Sarah Revoltella (Venice); Hermes Zaigott (Moscow); Burçak Konukman (Istanbul); Sean Donovan (New York); Sara Pagganwala (Karachi); and Colette Nucci (Paris).