Giovanna Lacedra

BIOGRAPHY

Giovanna Lacedra was born in 1977 in Venosa (Potenza, Italy). In 2000 she earned a BA degree in Painting at the Academy of Fine Arts in Florence. In 2004 she got the teaching certification at the University of Pisa. Then she moved to Milan, where for many years she lives and works as visual artist, performer and author. She also teaches Drawing and Art History in a public scientific high school. She currently lives and works in Ravenna.

She has performed both in her own projects and in projects of other artists, such as: “The Bastard’s Coffin” by Daniele Alonge - 2011; “Yummy Good!” by Manuela De Merito – 2011.

In 2011 she conceived, wrote and performed the Confessional Performance “I SUBTRACT - The Food-Body-Weight Triangulation”, a project on the anorexic-bulimic pathology which Giovanna Lacedra staged until 2015 during a traveling tour with 14 stops in art galleries, museums, exhibition spaces and in many Italian cities like Milan, Sassuolo, Cesena, Pescara, Lecce, Naples, etc... The performance was staged also at the “Leonardo da Vinci” Science and Technology Museum in Milan in occasion of the III edition of Step09 Art Fair – November 2011, and in Venice, where it was staged on May 9, 2015, during the opening of the 56th International Art Exhibition. It was also part of the V edition of the Anzio and Nettuno Biennial of Contemporary Art. The performance was introduced in 2016 in the thesis of some students graduated at the University of Bologna, Faculties of “Drama, Arts and Music Studies” and “Cultural Heritage”, and at the Academy of Fine Arts in Florence, courtesy of the artist. In addition, the “Walter Tobagi” School of Journalism at the University of Milan made a video-interview in occasion of Expo 2015, published in the ExpoStories platform.

“THE ASPIRANT” is a performance conceived and written in September 2013, after the rereading f the homonymous poem by Sylvia Plath and her Diaries. It is a project in which Giovanna Lacedra addressed the issues of abuse and gender violence, an intellectual and psychological violence rather than physical. It was staged by Roberto Milani and the artist herself between 2013 and 2015 in the following location: Amy-D art gallery in Milan; ArtVerona 2013, for CUNTemporary Art | Feminism | Queer (a non-profit organisation from London); Cesena Municipal Gallery, Old Fish Market, with the sponsorship of the City of Cesena and the Department of Political Differences; House Museum of Ludovico Ariosto in Ferrara; Voltorre Cloister in Gavirate (Varese) during “The snow has no voice”, exhibition curated by Alessandra Redaelli.

Taking inspiration from the homonymous poem by Vittorio Varano, in May 2013 Giovanna Lacedra wrote the text for the performance “LIKE THE SEA IN A GLASS”, staged with the participation of Irene Lucia Vanelli between 2014 and 2015 at: 77Art Gallery in Milan; MAG – Marsiglione Art Gallery in Como; V edition of “BODY | Performance Art Festival” in Pescara, curated by Ivan D'Alberto and Sibilla Panerai.

In June 2014 Giovanna Lacedra conceived “EDGE | Ultimo Ritr-Atto (EDGE | The Last Portrait/Act)”, a performance based on verses of the last poem by Sylvia Plath and a path of 100 portraits made in watercolors as countless shrouds-traces through which the poet is depicted. Giovanna Lacedra staged the performance first at the House Museum of Ludovico Ariosto in Ferrara and then at the ArtFarm Pilastro in Bonavigo (Verona).

In autumn 2014 she conceived a performance on child abuse, loosely based on the book “The girls’ notebooks” by the psychologist Maria Rita Parsi. Its title is “NONSONOMAISTATAUNABAMBINA (I’ve never been a child)”. Photographer and actor Massimo Festi and little Julia Fumagalli performed with the artist. The monologues are written by Giovanna Lacedra with music by Larva Casei. The performance was staged twice: at Pirola Palace, Gorgonzola (Milan) in May 2013 and at the Biffi Arte gallery in Piacenza in November 2014 . Both events were part of the exhibition “Feminine, Plural” curated by Alessandra Redaelli. “NONSONOMAISTATAUNABAMBINA” was revisited in solo version in February 2016 and staged in that version at InStudio, exhibition space of Marcello Gobbi in Brescia, on the occasion of the exhibition “Umbra et Imago” with works by the artist Roberto Messina.

In “EMOTIONAL REVOLUTION | Hands Knead the Heart” the performative action transforms the inner emptiness in nutrition: it is a real emotional revolution, in which rising from the crumbs becomes possible. The performance was staged for the first time on March 19, 2016, at Con-Temporary Art Circle, Saba Najafi’s Studio in Milan, for Studi Festival 2016. The second stage was on June 25, 2016, at the IV edition of the festival “THE VOICE OF THE BODY” - Osnago (Lecco).

“FEELING-CAGE” is a performance which deals with the theme of loss of self in an annihilating cage. It was staged for the first time on April 12, 2016 at Alphacentauri in Parma, on the occasion of the exhibition “Follow The Banana”. The second time it was staged on May 14, 2016, during “ART ACTION”, International Performance Art Festival at the Civic Museum of Monza.

“PARADEIGMA” is a slow interactive ritual which wants to symbolically awaken the fundamental, archetypal and initial model, born with our own life. This model is known as daimon, that is the destinic image, the vocation forgotten but which determines us in our uniqueness, according to Plato, Jung and Hillman. The performance was staged on October 22, 2016 at Punto sull’Arte Gallery in Varese. The exhibition was curated by Alessandra Redaelli and “Paradeigma” published in the catalogue.

“LE GABBIE DI VINCENT (VINCENT’S CAGES)” is a performance that investigates the simple, authentic and profound words of an artist whose biography has often overwhelmed his authentic poetic, pictorial and verbal ferocity. Vincent had made painting, the his freedom and at the same time his imprisonment. That energy was released only in the act of painting and was "heard" only in the gesture of writing. A performance in which the vital energy, that high yellow note, will return to the body, to the skin, to the flesh, to the soul.  Live performance: Saturday 7 July - LA VOCE DEL CORPO Festival of Performing Arts - Fifth Edition. Osnago (Lecco)

• Collaboration 2019: MACRO ASILO, Museum of Contemporary Art of Rome:  from the project "DAVIDE AND GOLIA" by Kyrahm, the performance "THE MOTHER" written by Kyrahm herself, a reinterpretation of the desperate words of Felicia Impastato, mother of Peppino Impastato, following her murder. Performers: Giovanna Lacedra, Kyrahm, Fulvia Patrizia Olivieri. Saturday 16th March 2019

“THE SHADOW OF WHITE SEEN FROM THE SUN” is a performance that lends a voice to the mysterious mother of Leonardo Da Vinci: Caterina. And he investigates, through the obsessive reproduction of the fetus drawn in the embryology tables now preserved in Windsor Castle, the indissoluble bond between a mother and her child. A bond that was never lived in reality, but certainly in blood and memory. PARMA360 Festival - IV edition - 17 May 2019. Curated by Chiara Canali.

“CLARESCERE (BEING LIGHT)” is a longitudinal path. To cross on tiptoe. Clarescere means shedding light. Slowly return to manifest themselves. In a necessary time, a necessary slowness. Clarescere is a thin white path to cross. Live Performance "Calisto Cafè" - Vailate (CR) - 11 JUNE 2019.

“FROM THE LAST TIME I WAS BORN” is a performance written by the poet Paola Turroni. What unites us to the animal is not only instinct and aggression, it is also empathy, this almost ferocious way of feeling the other. Feeling the other without escape. Feeling the pain, feeling the death and even the rebirth. Pain is a bestial dimension, it is a truth that overwhelms and requires the effort to break shells to return to being. September 28, 2019 - Villa Contemporanea Gallery - Monza.

“WHAT IS LOVE”  is a durational performance made in streaming during the period of the lockdown caused by the Covid19 pandemic emergency. It is an action-reflection on the notable increase in gender, psychological and verbal violence, which occurred during this period of isolation and forced coexistence. Live Performance in streaming: Saturday 2 May 2020, Fan Page Facebook “Gio Lacedra”, from 15.00 to 23.59.

Giovanna Lacedra has taken part in photographic projects of Massimo Prizzon, Pablo Peron, Christian Zucconi, Marco Chiurato, Franco Donaggio, Antonio Delluzio, Massimo Festi, Ramona Zordini.

She has written critical texts for artists such as: Elisa Anfuso, Anna Caruso, Paola Mineo, Urban Solid, Daniele Duò, Pep Marchegiani, Alessio Bolognesi, Cristina Iotti,  Alessandro Carnevale, Luca Dalmazio, Antonio Delluzio.

She writes on “Wall Street International Magazine”- Art section, and has her own Blog titled “EllePourArt”, dedicated exclusively to art made by women, including young or historicized artists, female painters, sculptors, photographers, performers, poets.