RED SHOES
NOTE YOUR “RED SHOES”
In the scenic space of “Red shoes” the sacred function of the cross merges with the intimate dimension of the room in a relationship of diamorphic transparency in which Karen's vanitas reveals its inevitable penitential nature. On his way of the cross, dramatic journey-ordeal, Karen passes through six chambers of dual sinful and remissory capacity, wearing the double tongue of the scourge, wood and blood. Mouth sealed, the verb of pleasure is just thought, and the beauty of its genetic golden lotus – little Lolita from Nanjing – it intoxicates and confuses the modesty of men and women with no more desires. Little orphan destined for the resurrected appetite of old ladies, children not effeminate for the emotional measures of elegant shoemakers, little girl ready to receive the lewd and naughty touch of deformed soldiers, Karen evokes the vertigo of silent passions hidden beyond the door of moral heaven. He strikes and distorts the sacredness of the sacraments by singing the funeral vigil of modesty for dying mothers and raising his tiny red sinful faith to a Eucharistic mystery. Pleasure has changed into pain, awakens within oneself the passion of pity and forgiveness, transfusing in the finale of death the grace of punishment into the ecstasy of angelic blonde penances.
THEME_THE CROSS AND THE CHAMBER
NE EVACUETUR CRUX CHRISTI_SO THAT THE CROSS OF
CRISTO.
BLAISE PASCAL
SHORTLY LATER SHE MADE HIM THROUGH A LARGE STONE ARCH: ON THE Vault PAO-YÜ READ THIS INSCRIPTION: “ILLUSIONARY KINGDOM OF THE GREAT VOID”; AND ON THE PILLARS ON THE RIGHT AND LEFT: “FROM APPEARING TO BEING, FROM BEING TO APPEARING; FROM NOTHING COMES THE ONE, FROM ONE COMES NOTHING.
TS’AO HSÜEH-CH’IN
SVOLGAMENTO_LIGNEA MY RED SORRY SHOWS OUT
THE VAINGLORY. Admiration spoils everything from childhood: “oh, as is well said! how well he did! how judicious!” ecc. The children of Port_Royal, to whom this spur of emulation and vainglory is refused, they fall
in indolence.
BLAISE PASCAL
PENITENTIAL CAPACITY AND VOLUMES:
N. 1 CHAMBER OF LOVING MADNESS
N. 2 CHAMBER OF JEALOUSY
N. 3 CHAMBER OF MORNING TEARS N. 4 CHAMBER OF NIGHT SIGHS
N. 5 SPRING TROUBLE CHAMBER N. 6 CAMERA DELL’ AUTUMN AFFLICTION
N. 6 AUTUMN AFFILATION CHAMBER
APOCALlSSE_6,15 The seven seals
6. When the lamb opened the first of the seven seals, I heard in a vision the first of the four living ones say as if with a voice of thunder: “Alone!”
STRAIT 109 Sdlmo of the master of singers of DavÍd
God of my songs do not be silent / an evil mouth is open against me / a double tongue speaks to me.
THE GNOSTIC APOCALYPSE_CODE V, 17,19 – 24,9
They placed it at the gate of the fourth heaven. And the angels whipped her. The soul spoke saying: “What a sin I have committed in the world?”
CARL THEODOR DREYER_ DIES IRAE, 1943 ROBERT BRESSON_MOUCHETTE, 1967
KENJI MIZOGUCHY_LA VITA IN O-HARU, 1952 STANLEY KUBRICK_LOLITA, 1962
THE ACTOR DAN<THE FOOT OF THE LOTUS FLOWER’
One of the roles in Chinese theater was dan, that is, that of the actors who played the female characters. In the 1777 Indeed, by imperial order, women were forbidden to act together with men, a ban that remained until the twentieth century. Having to behave like women, these actors received particular teaching. The first thing concerned the education of the voice, they had to act and sing in falsetto (the “fake you”, jiasangxi), with a subtle tone and a little’ acute; they therefore had to learn to move their hands delicately, to smile at “rose bud” (yingtao xiaozui) and so on. However, the most painful thing for young people (they were always children or adolescents) who played dan roles was walking. Chinese women of rank generally had their feet crippled and bandaged to make them smaller, until it measures seven or eight centimeters. The deformation, which began in childhood, it consisted of folding four fingers backwards, under the sole of the foot, leaving only the big toe protruding. The use, which dated back to the Song era (960-1279) it was dictated by canons of beauty and eroticism. Chinese ladies therefore always walked in an unsafe manner, in small steps, swaying and often sustained: their price in arranged wedding contracts was high if they possessed the said feet “lotus flowers” (sancun jinlian). The imitation of women therefore led the actor to walk on special clogs or “feet” wooden (qiaoxie) which held the end vertically, almost at the tip: in this position the feet were bandaged and put into tiny shoes. The unusual gait created deformations of the spine and pelvis. Naturally the use of dan actors, who were generally pretty, effeminate kids, favored the spread of homosexuality and prostitution which, thanks to the use of opium, caused scandalous episodes, sometimes even blood, out of jealousy or betrayal.
RED SHOES
DE R0DE SKO_THE RED SHOES
from De rede Sko by Hans Christian Andersen
text | imagoturgy || Francesco Pititto
regia || Maria Federica Masters
scene | costumes | visual elements || Maria Federica Masters
musica || Andrew Azzali
interpreters || Sara Monferdini | Matthew Ramponi |Elisa Orlandini | Sandra Soncini
light design || Rocco Giansante
costume making || Manuela Barigazzi
production || Lenz Refractions
first || Lenz Refractions
duration || 70 minutes
Production included in Hans Cristian Andersen 2005 Foundation’s Celebrations
The show was presented at the Natura Dèi Teatri International Festival, Parma
