Commedia dell’Arte (video)

Venice. Charles Fréger creates a set of silhouettes, this time animated.
Here are the twelve characters of the Commedia dell Arte gathered on the same plane. Following a vertical axial symmetry, the two lovers face each other, then mirror couples, the valet Brighella – Colombine, the woman polichinelle – Pedrolino, Pantalon – Doctor, the courtesan – Zanni and Capitane – Arlequino. The characters appear in pairs and each perform a 360 degree turn, clockwise. In each turn, the character develops an emotion and in a flash love gives way to disgust, malice, greed, seduction,
desire, mockery, bliss, sadness…

Charles Fréger asks the actors of the Pantakin theater in Venice to play these feelings and moods without a word being spoken. What emerges from these confined environments is a messy, almost animal-like language of onomatopoeia, sighs, groans, gasps, grunts and growls. In the last round, during the third minute, all the characters are in rotation, and all their sounds collide in an assumed cacophony.

Video instalation, 4 projections, L’Etable, ferme Hervieu, France, 2019

Overview, 6 couples. 3’20”

I due amanti (3 rotations)

Brigella e Colombina (2 rotations)

Courtisane e Zanni (1 rotation)

Capitan e Arlecchino (1 rotation)

Il Pantalone e il dottore (2 rotations) 

Pulcinella e Pedrolino (1 rotation)