Idiota by Marlene Monteiro Freitas The GREC Festival at MACBA

Marlene Monteiro Freitas brings an intimate piece to the Grec Festival and to MACBA, performed by herself and created at the request of a Cabo Verde institution, which tasked her to produce a work inspired by the paintings of the artist from the same country, Alex da Silva (1974-2019). Taking this visual source of reference, she has created a choreography that takes place in a box: the one belonging to the famous Pandora.

This first mortal woman according to Greek mythology, like Eve in the Christian tradition, brings disaster to humanity. She does this by opening the famous box, full of all the ills that are directly responsible for men and women becoming beset by troubles and dying. Yet this Pandora, so unfairly regarded (her name roughly translates as “she who gives all”) not only unleashes plagues and woe, but also, through death, frees up birth and consequently brings fertility to the world. A character by the name of Idiota slips inside the box to spy on Hope. The latter, with the help of Agitation, throws herself against the sides of the box and challenges him to find a way out between the windows turned into mirrors and a door containing a self-portrait.

Marlene Monteiro Freitas is a Lisbon-based artist originally from Cabo Verde. She is one of the most personal creators to emerge on the European scene in recent years, author of shows based on dance but often veering towards performance art.