I’m not gonna crack, 2019

A collaboration with Noemi Niederhauser & Jennifer Niederhauser Schlup

During the Renaissance in the 15th – 16th centuries, when utopianism and the quest to discover alternative ways of life erupted from within the intense cultural upheavals of that time, several plans for « ideal cities » were designed by architects. Although they never materialized, these plans for potential cities aspired to an ideal urban configuration and an ideal life. I’m not gonna crack, made at CERCCO-HEAD Geneva, takes as the reference « The Ideal City » by Fra Carnevale (oil painting; ca. 1480-1484; Renaissance). The painting consists of a city landscape glowing in the morning light, with a perfect geometry and perspective. It is a window onto another and better world; a world where everything plays a specific part and is designed accordingly, one that has been dispossessed of disarray and the inconsistency inherent to emotions, emptying it of almost any human activity.

Zooming into details of the painting; I’m not gonna crack, references but reverses this « Ideal » with geometries distorted, scales disrupted, a care for the physicality and textures of materials, a sense of the unfinished and non normative. It intertwines cement, mycelium, ceramic and bodies into a swirling dance, one stretching and colliding into the other. An ode to processes of transformation; I’m not gonna crack ushers a combination where notions of nature and culture, organic and man-made are dispossessed of any active-passive relationship. Flesh and stains. Stones and veils. Shapes and veins.

« Ring the bells that still can ring Forget your perfect offering There is a crack in everything That’s how the light gets in . » Leonard Cohen, Anthem

Installation and diner performance made of:

— Adjustable design elements for display: mycelium modules (bio material), cement modules, mixture of cement-clay-porcelain modules

— Sculptures: ceramic and custom-made glazes

— Curtain: photograph printed on fabric