On Tuesday, 21 February 2023, the last day of Carnival, Annalù will introduce Talea – a new, as yet unseen work in her sculpted series “Liquid Flower”.

Annalù believes in metamorphosis as a means to penetrate the mysteries of creation; and it is with this belief that she will, at 2pm on 21 February, publicly present TALEA, a fantastic bud that the artist will wear on her head while promenading around the city. At the end of the performance, the sculpted work will be set on its own dedicated pedestal within the Ravagnan Gallery in Dorsoduro.

The performance is meant to pay homage to the City and to the Ravagnan Gallery, and it is inspired by and dedicated to Lorenzo Ravagnan, the well-known gallery manager who left his own indelible mark on Venice’s art scene, by organizing memorable performances with his artists from the 1960s onwards, but also by promoting public debates, events and meetings with celebrated figures who loved Venice and its culture.

Annalù will stage her performance by blending in with the masks that are going to crowd the city of Venice at the high point of its Carnival – an event that is as old as the hills and whose origins are shrouded in myth. The earliest official document alluding to the feast dates back to 1296, when the Senate of the Republic ruled that the Venice Carnival was to be a holiday preceding the beginning of Lent. Since then, the tradition of the Carnival has livened up the atmosphere of the city each year, with Mardi Gras as its culminating moment, its biggest explosion before bidding farewell to this celebration of abundance and flesh (and before saying goodbye to meat).

Annalù will parade along the calli, Venice’s characteristic narrow alleyways, with her TALEA – a big fantastic flower whose seeming lightness gets transmogrified into the life and breath of a sculpture which becomes a warm living body, thus emanating a strong seducing force and a highly sensual charge. Everybody’s attention will be directed to the body of this “liquid flower”, because the artist herself will be hidden behind a black cloak, the ancient Venetian tabarro.
Talea is a graft, and it is a new life. Talea is the deepest connection with Nature and the Universe. It is the creation of a new organism, where severing something and planting it into a new terrain becomes a symbol of living, elaborate memory, of the sap of life which creates ever new experiences.

Talea – sculpture and perfomance Resinglass, inks cm 80x75x75h 2023

ravagnangallery.com

Photogallery