TOPOGRAPHIES OF SILENCE

is a project that began in January 2020, when colleagues Ingrid André and Gabriele Goria — both performers, pedagogues, and artists with a shared interest in psychosomatic practices — decided to create a weekly time and space to explore silence, stillness, and presence. With no rules and no preconceived form beyond a commitment to being present with an inclusive attitude, the experiment intuitively raised questions about time, production, and the inevitable relationality of bodies with one another.

The piece was performed at Myymälä 2 Gallery, Helsinki, as part of RAW Festival in August 2020, and at Vapaan Taiteen Tila, Helsinki, as part of Kartoitus Festival in November 2020. The project was developed during the Covid-19 pandemic, and the artists inevitably found themselves exploring what it means to be relational bodies once touch had been removed from public space.

One can sense immediately that their performative presence is not merely a collage of representative aesthetics but is embedded and supported by an embodied intelligence that opens into meanings beyond the frame of the moment

— Gesa Piper, teacher at the Theater Academy Helsinki; independent Dance and Performance artist.