Selezioni
performance by Filippo Riniolo
26 January 2023 at 6 p.m.
Introduction by
Filippo Riniolo, author of the performance
Francesco Cascino, art consultant
With the sponsorship of the Jewish Community of Milan and the presence of president Walker Meghnagi
In observance of the Remembrance Day, which comes on January 27th every year, the artist Filippo Riniolo gave a performance entitled Selezioni on January 26th 2023, at Nashira Gallery. Through his artistic study and channels, the artist brought us closer to the tragedy of the Holocaust, surrounding the audience in his words and bringing an emotional quality to the room.
A page from Se questo è un uomo by Primo Levi explains the selection procedure for new inmates. Nazi officers were used to select the Jews’ destiny by going through their cards. One officer held those cards: the man on the right received one portion of the ballots, while the man on his left received the other portion of the votes.
Death was on one side and life was on the other.
Not a contemplation or afterthought, not a laborious procedure.
Riniolo has layered the modern gesture of the social media technology interface on top of this gesture, as terrible as it is easy to perform. Twirl to the left and then to the right. The eyes on the screen. The thumb slides without thinking, almost as an automatism.
In order to depict the names of the 1022 Jews deported during the rounding up of the Rome Ghetto, the artist scrolls down the list and moves the names in different directions, placing the people who did not return on the one side, the survivors on the other side.
Only sixteen of them survived.
As a soundtrack for the performance is the song Rosamunda, the marchette that was played in Auschwitz during the entry and exit of prisoners from the camps.
