Scott Gibbons

The man who goes through purgatory – the “song of the earth” – is a curious being, constantly stopped by the concrete nature of the things and objects that surround him, in a depiction of his own life. This material occupies him, blocks his way, attaches him and often torments him. It bears witness to what exactly purgatory is to Romeo Castellucci: human life in its daily repetition, familiarity with everyday tasks, the trap of routine, the experience of the ordinary body, encounters with the finished world, known nature, the substances of life.

Theatron, the film by the multi-award-winning film-maker Giulio Boato, is an unprecedented portrait of Romeo Castellucci. Castellucci and his theatre company, the Socìetas Raffaello Sanzio, are key protagonists of avantgarde theatre. To a Vivaldi soundtrack, Theatron layers Romeo and Claudia Castellucci’s comments with the testimonies of dramaturgs, composers, choreographers, critics and actors (including Willem Dafoe) who have collaborated with the director. Between rehearsals and international tours, the film is a deep reflection not just on the performances, but also on the connection between the author and the representation of human nature.

Dante's 'La Divina Commedia' is a poem in three parts about a journey to hell, purgatory and finally, paradise. Romeo Castellucci created his own free adaptation on the gigantic stage of the Cour d'Honneur in Avignon, in the palace where the first French pope, Clement V, resided. The pope allows Dante to descend into the inferno. We are confronted with man's confusion, the fragmentation of the community and the darkness of art.

Romeo Castellucci is one of Europe’s best-known directors, a firebrand known for productions that are as thought-provoking as they are visually stunning. He returns to Peak Performances with the American premiere of “Democracy in America,” freely inspired by the work of Alexis de Tocqueville. Castellucci conjures majorettes who stir the crowd’s enthusiasm for democracy in America, colonial settlers who confound the native Americans, and a puritan couple who struggle to farm a barren land. He asks us to consider the empty promises of a political system steeped in Biblical egalitarianism rather than the concept of tragedy so essential to ancient Greek democracy, the dangers of majority rule, and the inherent violence that springs from religious puritanism and territorial conquests. His challenging, soul-stirring brand of theatrical magic transposes these painful, profound ideas into an enticing, vibrant, celebratory work of art.

Inspired by Mark Rothko’s refusal to complete commissioned work in New York’s Four Seasons restaurant. A highly stylized, visually stunning exploration of absence, negation, and solitude.

A human figure dressed as a woman is anatomically exposed by means of a series of photographic poses. The show is seeped from beginning to end in darkness, an allusion to the photographic negative.

As the first character to appear – the Mother – enters a square, gold-walled room, she blends so perfectly into the background that all perspective is lost. The visual order is disarticulated by the reflection of the gold to such an extent that even the woman skin loses its “hold” on solidity.

In an environment coloured with talcum powder, the Soldiers of Conception escort a Child-Judge as he walks backwards across the set. When he bumps into the Tables of the Law, reality is overturned and all interiors becomes exterior.

A spectral representation of all names. All the nouns found in the Italian dictionary are projected, in a sequence, one by one, onto a giant screen. These nouns potentially represent all objects in reality that have a name. The speed of this sequence is given by our ability, based on our retina and our memory, to retain a word that appears in a flash, lasting one tenth of a second. This constricts our gaze, which soon reaches a tipping point where a fusion occurs, just before our perception loses its grip. In the resulting flicker, it is no longer possible to distinguish the single terms. In the borderline situation created by this frenetic series of words, some of them will leave a trace on each spectator’s visual cortex, while others, the majority, will be lost.