Stainless is metal morphing into the organic, ceramics merging with the industrial, sculpture piercing the flesh, and body becoming sculptural. It is the layered process of translation and penetration at the core of the practice of choreographer/performer, visual artist and set designer July Weber (all pronouns), who turns the concrete space of the Insel into a stage over the course of three days. Curated by the artist in collaboration with Silvio Saraceno, Stainless operates at the intersection between sculpture and performance. It unfolds as a perpetual interplay, a “somatic living room” where soft wellness collides with fetishized sharp forms. This formalistic orgy features aggressive chess figures, giant piercings, melting ears, floating musical instruments and oversized razor blades- elements that penetrate each other and whose impact challenges the bodies that engage with them. Simultaneously, these symbols of mastery and corporal control, now deconstructed, reclaim their ephemeral nature and become pure toys alongside the body. Through subversion, they are liberated from their original purposes, dissolving the object/subject binarism and revealing their potential as tools for exploration rather than instruments of order. Here, the performer does not play chess or guitars as intended, but plays with them, constantly shifting and reshaping the composition, provoking unexpected sounds and eventually creating a soundscape. At times, the living room breaks free from its frame and elements- dragged and pushed- carry an improvised “metal" concert into the city. Stainless is a manifestation of the elusive character of playing as a tool for reconfiguration and its transformative power as a human impulse. It invites us to abandon the logic of the chessboard and embrace the fluid, yet dangerous, potential of play.

Text: Silvio Saraceno