2008 Complicity (about Crystallus Capillus)
By Clarissa Diniz
If the melting pot of culture has been noted and discussed for a while now, in his performance Crystallus Capillus, João Manoel Feliciano does not deny this phenomenon. For hundreds of minutes, the artist awaits, in slow silence, the melting of the blocks of ice that surround his long locks of hair, creating metaphors of the uninterrupted process of the transience of life, and adding his poetic contribution to the world-wide discussion of this.
His living body heats the ice, which then cools down, revealing a relationship of interdependence. In the interaction established between the artist and the blocks of ice and in spite of his signs of exhaustion that affect it – trembling, tiredness, numbness –, what becomes apparent is their inter-connectedness amidst the chaos. With apparent spontaneity, human and natural forms, normally oblivious to each other, endure slow processes, which, despite limited impact, go on investing in the continuity of small metamorphoses – uninterrupted for relatively long periods.
For an hour and a half, even the hardest parts of ice melt and slip away, moved by the complicity that emerges from this set-up, the truth of which brings warmth to all spectators, left dumbstruck by the potential of a silent and languid chaos.
Clarissa Diniz (Recife, 1985) is curator and art critic.
João Manoel Feliciano is a Spanish – Brazilian artist, active both in Europe and Brazil, he was graduated in Visual Arts at the Federal University of Pernambuco . Currently based in Berlin. Feliciano’s diverse body of work ranges from traditional media of drawing, painting, to process-oriented, videos and photography or time-based “action” art, The performances and videos are usually of long duration, function as a ritual and often circulate around his hair as a theme.
Conceptually, Feliciano suggests that hair exercises an undeniable effect (on both the artist and the audience) when it takes on psychological, social, racial and/or political subjects. In addition, some of his works incorporate animals, bones and especially organic, common materials as well as references to trees or anything that has had profound personal meaning and in some manner expose Feliciano’s life trajectory. Recurring motifs in his works suggest that art, the hair mythology, organic materials, and one’s “everyday life” are ultimately inseparable.And the way it is read and encoded often overflows in practical and poetic life in matters like space and landscape, identity, and time. photo:Helder Tavares
