Biennale College Teatro / Eliana Rotella - Livido

You know when you find a bruise on your body, and you can’t remember how you got it? This is a story with no trace of its beginning; there’s only a – temporary – mark. It’s a story that revolves around a memory lapse. How do you tell the story of a trauma you have no memory of?

On stage we see the black burn marks of a fire. It’s a legacy, an anonymous bequest. It seems as though no one has come into this place for a long time. The fire has spared the squared outline of a window on the back wall. The shutters are closed. A stem of ivy creeps through the cracks in the shutters. On stage are Echo, Narcissus and, between them, Ovid. Ovid is the name given to the person telling the story, a story they have actually lived. When Ovid speaks, they create the onstage world – expressing it, modifying it, rewriting it. The events are embodied and acted out by Echo and Narcissus. Echo has a green mark in the crease of her elbow, in what you call the cubital fossa, among her veins, in the area where blood is taken. It’s a huge, dazzling bruise. A hard jewel mounted on the epidermis. When a bruise turns green it means it’s been six days since the contusion happened; it’s the sign it’s starting to heal. But it’s the aftermath Ovid wants to talk about. Survival, and reconstruction. About the infinite ways we figure out how to stay alive.