🇬🇧 Interview with the aRtivist Alfredo Meschi

What does nudity mean for you?

I’m almost entirely tattooed, every X counts for me, as it corresponds to a sentient being, so I can’t ignore some of them. If that involves nudity, that’s not a problem for me.
Another reason that drives me to be naked is my affection for the idea of ​​”animality” in the noblest sense: we live in a society that wants to remove what in us brings us back to the animal, including nudity. This also leads me to show myself naked.

The aspect of non-verbal language in you is very present. I wanted to know what is more important to you: whether the reaction you arouse in the moment of the performance or the memory you leave with people?

I experience the performance extremely in first person, but I know that there is an audience that is participating. Sometimes the weight of the 40,000 X’s makes itself felt strongly on me, so I am not in contact with the 40,000 Xs in those moments because it would be unbearable. When a performance begins, after a very short time or even before it begins, this weight makes itself felt and what happens outside is inseparable from what happens inside.
When I do performances I hope to pass a message, beyond the performer’s ego, from body to body. Here lies the power of my activism: people often not involved in either Veg or contemporary art contests let themselves go to tears, despite the presence of the cameras.

Now let’s talk about project X: your body full of X could be traced back to horror vacui, or the fear of emptiness. Yet, the emptiness you communicate is very strong: you leave people alone to reflect with their conscience. This I think is one of the most powerful voids there is. Do you see yourself in what I say?

In some ways, yes, some of my friends call me the “conscientiser” because before contemporary art I taught a theater that aimed to “raise awareness”, in the wake of Augusto Boal’s “Theater of the oppressed”. I certainly carry this imprinting with me, but it is not voluntarily sought, since when this manifests itself, it does so to the extent that in that void there is also me, together with the observer.

In my last performance this summer, of criticism towards Marina Abramović many people sat with me, almost all unknown and almost all of them were very moved.
For me it was very strong and it took days to recover: I know the effect is that, I don’t hold back. However, when anguish comes, I am sorry, it is not an effect that I am actively seeking.