The Typist | 2009

Holding a portable typewriter, a bag containing a ream of paper sheets size A4, plastic bags and tape, I choose a place in the space, like the floor, stairs, chairs etc. I sit down, open the typewriter, take one sheet of paper from the bag, insert it in the machine and start writing about my impressions, as to what I see, what happens, what I think. I always start to write naming the place, date and number of the page. After being done with the page I store it into a plastic bag and with the tape I fix it at the place. Soon after I choose another place to write the next page.

After a period without presenting performance works (2006-2009) but thinking a lot about what had been produced, I created the performance The Typist. Differently from earlier works that focused on the development of one action, this one held a more experimental and relational sphere. Invited by SESC, I presented this performance where I rescue the practice of typing, which I fully dominated. This work has it’s starting point in the writing, from the printing in writing using an old technology and, even if the work shifts between journalism and literature, its main focus lies in the memory. Not only my memory related to practice but also the memory persons have of it, activated by the action of typing more then by the object itself, from the sound generated by a fast writing. A collective aural memory that slowly vanishes.