Santarcangelo, performance with completely naked actors in the square, attacks Northern League and Forza Italia

Last Friday, in Santarcangelo di Romagna (Rimini), the 48th edition of the Santarcangelo Festival, a historic festival of theater in the square that is among the main ones in Italy, opened. Inaugurating the 2018 edition was the performance Multitude by choreographer Tamara Cubas (Montevideo, 1972), a show that aims to analyze contemporary society, the notion of heterogeneity in collective spheres, the concepts of other, public space, and interpersonal relationships. The performance includes a dance in which some of the actors, in the final bars, undress, remaining completely naked: it is this feature of the performance that has sparked a fierce controversy.

Bruno Galli, provincial secretary of the Northern League, commented, “I’m embarrassed (and I’m certainly not a stickler) for those who (re)allowed this!!! We are in favor of the festival, let me be clear, in fact we will safeguard it and indeed ... enhance it by giving back to the word culture its true meaning! Santarcangiolesi, rest assured: this is the last year of degradation, just know it.” Criticism also came from Walter Vicario of Forza Italia, who expressed his intention to “give the festival back to the people of Santarcangiolesi,” stressing that “it’s about respect for people...but especially for the weaker groups, in particular I am referring to children who are too often mistreated and confronted with a fait accompli.” And again, “certainly in the face of such obscenities imposed in public (when at the limit they could have been performed behind closed doors with free choice of the participants) one can also make exposes.” The director of the Festival, Eva Neklyaeva, sending a comment to the Resto del Carlino wanted to respond by stressing that “these controversies are pure propaganda, aimed at manipulating people’s emotions. We believe that there is nothing offensive about a naked body, the history of art is full of them, even in public spaces.”

Tamara Cubas is, moreover, an internationally renowned choreographer: born in Uruguay under the military dictatorship, she suffered exile, moved to Cuba and studied in Uruguay, when she was able to return to the country, and in Holland. Her performances have been performed around the world, at various theater festivals, and in 2015 also at the Havana Biennial, where she represented Uruguay.

Pictured: a performance of Multitud in Barcelona in 2015

Santarcangelo, performance with completely naked actors in the square, attacks Northern League and Forza Italia

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