Imaginarius – Festival of Performing Arts in Public Space is now accepting applications for 30 volunteers, all adults and with diverse identities, to participate in a collective action in the historic centre of Santa Maria da Feira. The urban intervention MAMIL(a)S is an original creation by the Brazilian company Desvio Coletivo, which returns to Imaginarius to question who can occupy the city without being constantly challenged.
Three dozen bodies, entirely covered by fabrics that conceal gender markers, will reveal only one detail to passersby: the nipples, intimate parts that concentrate a profound contradiction when publicly exposed. The gesture continues to be interpreted unequally depending on whether it is performed by a male or a female.
The performance MAMIL(a)S aims to poetically question normative readings of presence in urban space, valuing the collective as a gesture of celebration and affirmation.
Nine years after presenting the impactful performance CEGOS at Imaginarius, Desvio Coletivo returns to the festival with another artistic project of social and political intervention, which questions and confronts the constraints imposed on the female body in urban spaces.
To realize this artistic project in Santa Maria da Feira, 30 participants will be involved, with or without artistic experience, provided they are of legal age and have diverse identities, reinforcing the plural and inclusive nature of the intervention.
Participation in this performance involves a personalized construction process in each territory, which combines moments of reflection, preparation, and direct contact with the urban space.
To that end, talks have already been scheduled around freedom, presence in public space and artistic creation, as well as actions to recognize the location and route in the historic centre, and physical preparation sessions through performative exercises.
This artistic intervention aims to demonstrate that walking through the city is not a neutral act. For some, it is an acquired right; for others, constant exposure, surveillance, and risk.
The action will focus on this structural imbalance, revealing how urban space continues to regulate who can occupy, traverse, and remain in it without being questioned.
“MAMIL(a)S is, therefore, a manifesto about the right to the city – and to one’s own body – written with skin, movement, and rebellion. A walking question: how long will the female presence in public space be treated as transgression and not as power?”, reads the official page of Desvio Coletivo.
For more information and registration for this artistic project, click here.
