© Pietro Rebora
Cinema Impero
Cinema Impero is named after a cinema built in the centre of Asmara in 1937 during the fascist regime. As a language, cinema has always had the power to create imaginaries and, at the same time, to shape and construct narratives, especially when used as propaganda by authoritarian regimes. The new languages of present-day artificial intelligences also attempt at once to surprise and distort reality. Cinema Impero is a meta-narrative that brings together multiple space-time layers and different linguistic elements: video material from the Istituto Luce historical archive and the artist’s private archive, narrated and executed by two voices and two intelligences, an artificial one and an emotional one. “Cinema Impero” is a black box that encompasses the language of film, theatre and the algorithms of artificial intelligence. Within this multi-sensory device, designed for one spectator at a time, the person is placed at the centre of the macro-narratives and invited to flow towards proximity, a space of intimate otherness, between narrator and listener.
Credits
Cinema Impero is the winning project of the first edition of blOOm, a one-on-one creation network, promoted and conceived by: Fondazione Armunia, Primavera dei Teatri, Santarcangelo Festival, Sardegna Teatro, and Triennale Milano Teatro.
Written and directed by: Muna Mussie
In collaboration with:
Video editing: Luca Mattei
Africanist ant(i)hropologist: Simao Amista
Contemporary art curator: Martina Angelotti
Musician: Matteo Nobile
Sound designer: SimonLuca Laitempergher
Translator: Susan Zuckerman
Project supported by the Italian Ministry of Foreign Affairs within the framework of LANDING
With the support of: Passage Festival, IIC Strasbourg, and the Export Department of ATER Fondazione Co-production: Museo delle Civiltà, Rome
Muna Mussie
“I am Muna Mussie, an artist of Eritrean origin, based in Bologna, where my journey in theatre and performance began. Between 1998 and 2001, I trained with Teatrino Clandestino, and in 2002 I attended the European Advanced Training Course for Actors led by Cesare Ronconi, an experience that marked the beginning of a long collaboration with Teatro Valdoca, which continued until 2012. In the early 2000s, I co-founded the research collective Open, an important space for experimentation. Over time, I have developed a practice that moves between performing and visual arts. My works include Madrepatria, Monkey See, Monkey Do, Milite Ignoto, and Punteggiatura, as well as more recent projects such as Oblio, Curva Cieca, Bologna St. 173, and Cinema Impero. My work often stems from an investigation into individual and collective memory, and embroidery has become part of my practice as a shared and participatory gesture. I have presented my work in a variety of contexts, including festivals, museums, and independent spaces in Italy and abroad. Some of my projects are included in public collections, such as MAMbo in Bologna. My artistic collaborations include Flavio Favelli, Massimo Carozzi, Invernomuto, Brett Bailey, Mette Edvardesen, Sara Manente, and Gianluca Mattei. What continues to guide my practice is research: experimentation across media and the desire to give form to the tension that emerges between different expressive poles.” Muna Mussie