Volare oh oh, cantare oh oh oh oh

In Tentativo di volo, 1970; De Dominicis tries to learn to fly by flapping his arms in the air and jumping from a mound, repeating this experience desperately. After several years of unsuccessful attempts to imitate bird flight, the artist passes this utopian wish on to his son to perpetuate this desire for flight, this desire for freedom and lightness. During the night of December 31 to January 1, the inhabitants of Naples throw damaged household objects from balconies or windows. This purifying act that accompanies the New Year comes from the historical episode, “The Four Days of Naples” (September 27-30, 1943) when the Neapolitan people attacked the forces of the Third Reich that occupied the city. Born as a gesture of rebellion and liberation, it later became a ritual of passage and also an act of incivility. De Novellis claims this action as a gesture to shed the weight of history and patriarchy in order to make room for other more inclusive narratives. In the performance, objects abandoned by their owners are reused before their ultimate end.

The artist Romina De Novellis revisits major works of arte povera in an ecofeminist perspective. She proposes to reinterpret and update certain themes and motifs of arte povera, in order to rethink, in resonance with this current, the relations between genders and between all living beings. Thus, consumerism, inequalities, the weight of the past and the resistance of living beings are all palpable concerns in her performances where the body of the female artist comes into play. In doing so, Romina De Novellis imagines a series of actions in resonance with the militant attitude and the use of simple materials of arte povera.

The proof is in the title, a tribute to the Italian artist and writer Ketty La Rocca, inspired by her collage, La cultura che non vive, created in 1964. The actions of Romina De Novellis reinvest certain attitudes of arte povera, with an affirmation of the female body, in an openly ecofeminist gesture. A way to remind that arte is a feminine word in Italian.

Romina De Novellis (1982) is a performer, visual artist and researcher, born in Naples, raised in Rome and living in Paris since 2008. Trained as a dancer, she studies the body from an anthropological perspective through the prism of Mediterranean cultures.

The artist uses ecofeminist theories as a parameter to analyze and denounce the oppressive realities of our societies and the dichotomies of nature-humanity, femininity-masculinity, north-south, scientific-intuitive, power-body, establishment-counter-culture. Her intention is to highlight the reappropriation of feminine traits by women and men, in order to challenge dominant models.

Her works have been presented in many contexts, including MAC – VAL in Ivry-sur -Seine, Ca’ Pesaro International Modern and Contemporary Art in Venice, MADRE Museum in Naples, Poznan Biennial in Poland, Armory Show in New York, Villa Datris Foundation, Espace Louis Vuitton, Palais de Tokyo, Musée de la Chasse et de la Nature in Paris, among others.

In 2019, Romina De Novellis initiated an artist and researcher residency project called Domus Artist Residency, based in Galatina, Italy.

Romina De Novellis is represented by Galerie Alberta Pane – Paris/Venice.

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