Revolucionaria Recreativa Repugnante, an artistic residency on the edge of art / Itziar Bilbao Urrutia 2017

From 7 to 14 October, Can Monroig will host the artist Itziar Bilbao Urrutia in residence, who will present her performance “Melusina” in this space on 13 and 14 October at 9 pm.

Just arrived from coordinating a workshop in BilbaoArt where he develops the theme on the “abject femininity”, Itziar Bilbao Urrutia will do a residency at Can Monroig, as the culmination of her project Disgusting Recreational RevolutionaryThese terms refer to her definition of the monstrous feminine, a concept that forms the basis of her work. Within the framework of Can Monroig, a refuge for art outside the realm of official culture, Itziar will present the performance “Melusina”.

Inspired by the historical setting of this unique space, the artist will interpret the legend of the half-woman, half-serpent creature from European folklore. Specifically, her appearance in French medieval chivalric novels, where romance and gender roles begin to define what couple, romantic love, and loyalty mean in Western culture.

Itziar says of Melusina: “She is a mysterious lady married to a French knight-errant, a fairy who agrees to live among mortals in the name of love. But her only condition is that she be allowed to remain in her chamber every Saturday, without disturbing and above all, without asking questions. Her husband agrees, but after years, jealousy and mistrust overcome his romantic aspirations. Peeking through a keyhole, he discovers Melusina’s secret, which is in the bathroom: on Saturdays, the lower part of her body transforms into that of a snake. When she is discovered, Melusina flies out the window, never to return. With her, the castle, the land, the winged-hoofed horses that Melusina conjured with her magic arts as a wedding gift disappear. The husband is left alone, without his beloved, without his possessions, without anything.

“I am attracted by Melusina's emphasis on preserving her autonomy, even within the framework of a medieval marriage. I am equally, if not more, attracted by the message between the lines, which punishes the husband for abusing his authority and rights as a husband, not to mention his betrayal, spurred on by the fear that his wife's freedom is a threat to his masculine authority. The man's betrayal, and not Melusina's monstrous condition, is the trigger for the tragedy. For me, Melusina and its demand to be respected in all its complexity, is a feminist icon.” Itziar says.

Itziar's work deliberately develops on the margins of what we understand as the art world, it is reactivated when it ignores the conventions that serve to keep the social fabric rigid and unblemished.

It questions what we understand as the domestic sphere, associated with the feminine, our deep-rooted ideas of what home, family, refuge, civilization, society, good manners mean, while the threat of the sexual subject and its potential for chaos are constant themes in Itziar's work. Can Monroig fits naturally into this quest to break the rules: abject femininity in an unusual home.

“In every dream home, a heart break” Let us break our silent hearts, so that their hidden desires may emerge.

Both the domestic environment and sexuality have been used to limit female autonomy. Melusina will focus on the acts perpetrated by a monstrous feminine; destructive of the normative values attributed to women, home, family, binary genders: certainties that define male/female relationships.

In the legend of Melusina, the medium chosen to explore these relationships is the shibari or the art of tying with Japanese ropes, which turn the object tied by the artist, in this case, the man, into a toy or decorative element. Thus re-defining ideas about masculinity, in terms of sexual agency. The woman as an active subject, aggressor; the man as a passive subject, subjugated. For reasons that, Itziar has explained many times, are not necessarily artistic, she creates images and practices that turn the man into an object ritually reified.   Can Monroig will be used as a space that amplifies and facilitates this challenge to the prevailing cultural values that censor the complexity of female desire. For one night, it will become a studio that shelters other gender identities that history and custom try in vain to marginalize.

Text and photos by Itziar Bilbao Urrutia

Itziar's Biography:

In 1996, Itziar Bilbao Urrutia moved to London after abandoning her Fine Arts studies in Bilbao. In 2004 she completed a master's degree in visual arts at Goldsmiths College in London and in 2015 she presented her doctoral thesis at the Department of Society and Government at the University of Birmingham. She has given lectures such as “Porn cultures” at the University of Leeds (2009) or “Sexual cultures” at the University of Sunderland (2015); she has presented numerous performances and exhibitions in London (ACT-ART, Performance Festival; 2009).), Canada (Montreal Short Film Festivall, 2005), Australia (Adelaide Fringe Festival, 2007), León (Genealogies – MUSAC, 2012) or Granada (Al Raso, art festival. Granada – performance with Ana Laura Alaez, 2008), among many others.

Itziar has been working as an independent artist outside the art circuit since 2002.

She combines her artistic practice with commercial video production and academic research. Since 2009 she has been an activist for Backlash UK, a British NGO that advocates for freedom of artistic and sexual expression and organizes campaigns against censorship and sexual stigma in the media, art and politics. Since 2010, she produces and edits The Urban Chick Supremacy Cell, a project that, using a fetish website as a platform, combines video performance and narrative of Femdom pornography.

More information about the talk and workshop given by Itziar Bilbao Urrutia at BilbaoArte.
Interview with Itziar in El País 14/12/2014

Complete CV Itziar Bilbao Urrutia