Portfolio Contextualisation

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Hello,

If you are reading this, it´s probably because you somehow came across my portfolio. Thank you for being here and interacting, or not. This contextualisation offers an insight into my background, the reason for this portfolio, its ingredients and its intentions.

Feel free to read it, OR NOT.

First, let me tell you a little bit about myself: I am an aerialist, performance artist, and a survivor of rape. I was assigned female at birth (AFAB), I am white, abled and lower/middle class raised in Austria (= I am mostly super privileged!) In my research, I am exploring the body as a material and method for generating knowledge. For me, the body is a site where social, political and gendered structures are not only represented but can be resisted and ruptured. As an AFAB and survivor of rape, but also as a circus artist specialised in aerial arts, I have experienced how vulnerability is aestheticised while strength is disciplined, pain is normalised, shame is female, complicity is rarely felt. My work focuses on the consequences of action and inaction, of risk, violence, control and on the systems that allow these conditions to persist.

This portfolio requires interaction, risk, and your presence. It exists in relation, not as an object for the gaze.

My research explores how patriarchal systems regulate bodies, how bodies are seen, valued, disciplined, sexualised, and marked vulnerable. Social norms, institutional structures, sexual violence, beauty standards, labour expectations in the circus. A central question in my research concerns the responsibility we carry for the system we inhabit. Rather than offering answers my works create situations in which responsibility can be experienced, where the audience can become an active participant, whose complicity carries consequences and connections. Its fragility and strength.

My body in suspension raises the question: what is suspension? In air, in time, in meaning?

The body is organic matter. I question and refuse the requirement of durability of this portfolio, as the body is the central material in my research, and bodies change. This stands in opposition to academic requirements that are based in the patriarchal and capitalist system, where things need to stay the same forever (especially the female body and beauty), and that things do not need care (in german we have this explicit term "wegwerfgesellschaft” that discribes the capitalist, careless society).

Through time in my portfolio mould can develop, as an organic process, as a transformation in time. Like all organic matter, our bodies transform through interaction, time, violence, care,… Mould is subversive, refusing to be contained, to be controlled. A system that moulds from the inside.

This portfolio is not intended only to document my research, but also as an exploration of how interaction and time shape systems. Like a performance, I spend a lot of time creating it, but once it is offered to be shared, I do not have control over it anymore and therefore it resists fixed outcomes and refuses stability and neutrality. By placing two identical copies in very different contexts (one will stay in the academic realms of ArtEZ university, the other will be handed over to a collective housing project connected to a circus space) this portfolio explores how meaning shifts depending on who is addressed. Because my research engages with social issues, gendered questions, responsibility and embodied risk, it cannot remain un-activated in an academic storage. It must circulate and encounter people who are not necessarily into theory and conceptual art. Going beyond academia is therefore necessary for the expansion and scope of it.

This portfolio is a living system, that holds, excludes, protects, breaks. It mirrors systems in a small scale. It allows to act freely and to document decisions, opinions, and interpretations. The documentation is another material expression of how you navigate complicity and responsibility when it is not prescribed. Therefore, the portfolio performs the research itself rather than just illustrating it.

Each material that I placed inside the portfolio at the beginning (when is that?) is chosen for its multiple and sometimes conflicting meanings.

You can change it. You can change the system.

Following I will tell you why I chose the initial ingredients. They might have very different meanings for you, and that’s amazing, or they might have changed significantly over time and through previous interactions and that even better!

The box holds the tools, ingredients, systems,… but it is cardboard. Its shape might change over time. It will collapse if it gets too wet.

The glass container represents systems that seem transparent and neutral, suggesting visibility and clarity. But it also represents another form of a body with its fragility and strength. You can change this system. Glass holds and protects but it also can cut and injure. Reflecting structures that claim objectivity whilst being capable of violence.

I use condoms in my drag king performances. Here it is a representation of a vessel that holds, a body that needs care whilst being handled as is easily breaks (risk). It references sexuality, intimacy and responsibility. Suspended on the glass container it refers to my aerial practice, to the suspension of reproduction and STIs.

At the same time the carries the contradiction of sexual assault, where condoms are rarely used; instead, I fill it with cranberry juice. Intentionally, I do not use blood, even though it might read as it initially. Cranberry juice is a natural aid for bladder infections, an illness that affects people with vaginas disproportionately and that can emerge through “dirty” sexual practices. Disclaimer: Hygiene in rapes is usually not the priority for the perpetrator. It triggers associations with violence whilst addressing gendered themes of shame, pain and medicalisation in a patriarchal system.

The plastic strings offered in the box are ripped parts of my aerial apparatus, that I call Medusa and performed with in my performances BEATCH N CANDY and  SEAFOAM. It refers directly to the myth of Medusa, but also to the environmental challenges we are facing and materiality that refuses to age. Just like patriarchy would like women to be: forever young. The myth embodies rage, punishment and the reclamation of agency, whilst plastic as a material links her to ecological violence, patriarchal and capitalist durability.

The make-up sponge is a tool I use when preparing for a drag king show. I choose this particular shape as it resembles an anal-plug and therefore references sexual practices. At the same time it is a soft material used for your face, beauty standards. It represents the intersection of pleasure, aesthetics and gendered expectations.

I use tissues to undo my drag makeup, to clean up liquids (after sexual intercourse, or when cranberry juice is spilt 😉). Tissues clean, remove traces. Within the system, they point out gendered expectations of cleanness and care-work.

Cashew nuts are a protein-rich snack that I can easily have during long training sessions, as they allow me to continue hanging upside down without feeling sick. In my imagination, they resemble a flexed arm and stand for nourishment, strength and optimisation. Circus bodies are expected to be maintained, improved, and exploited, whilst exhaustion is made invisible.

The tweezer (I use it for drag king preparations) allows interaction deep into the system, whilst it can also be used to create distance to the objects. Scissors are used to cut apart, to destroy materials or to maintain them. Before each performance on my Medusa I “cut her hair” maintaining the plastic stripes “clean”. I cut my hair very frequently since I wear it short, and use my cutted hair for my drag king beard.

Post-its not only hold the information about this portfolio but are an intrgral part of my creation processes, where I note sequences, ideas, themes I want to explore.

Proton online documentation system: even here you are free to change the system: add, modify, delete.

The fake skin as part of the bold wig I used before razorshaving my head for BEATCH N CANDY and I now use it as a base to glue my hair and create a beard for my drag practice.

My hair is the most personal part I added to this portfolio. My bold head can be interpreted in several distinct ways: 1. Freedom from beauty standards, 2. Illness, or 3. Related to power and shame – as a lot of cultures and political or religious movements shave womens hair to disgrace them.  You can add some of your hair to the system. Or you can eat a cashew nut.

You choose what you do with the system.

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Following you can find information from June 2025 about SEAFOAM a project focussed on dramaturgical operations. This is not specifically related to the portfolio, but still connects to my research.

SEAFOAM RESEARCH

Dismantling aerial practice

What if…aerial practice fell apart?

SEAFOAM is an artistic research project that examines vulnerability and responsibility, through dramaturgical operations of audience engagement, intensification and destruction whilst dismantling the normative aesthetics of aerial practice.

Dramaturgical operations and concepts and lineages

Destroying material and deconstructing norms and Press

By intentionally destroying the equipment I hang from on stage, I deconstruct the norms of aerial practice, where perfection, control and virtuosity define the aesthetics, with its expectations of grace, gender and perfection (Tait, 2005, 4, 70). This dramaturgical operation of destruction was influenced by Johannes Mach´s act “Press” which I saw in January 2025 at Fontys University. In the performance Mach enters the stage and gives a red buzzer to an audience member. He then climbs onto a  trapeze, performs a few tricks and, by nodding to the audience member holding the buzzer, he encourages her to press it. When she does so, a string with a scissor attached lowers from above. Mach takes the scissors and cuts one of the trapeze strings, whilst sitting on it. This sequence repeats until all strings are “cut”, causing the trapeze to split in two and Mach to fall onto the mat. 

Inspired by this act and wanting to use a quick release system (which make it look like the aerial equipment breaks whilst remaining safe) on my aerial plastic equipment, I contacted him for information about the system he uses. I tear the plastic strings below the Mini-Hoop and using the recommended sailor´s quick-release system I create the effect of destroying the very base (above the mini-hoop) of my aerial equipment without risking actual failure. Instead of free-falling like Mach whilst the equipment “breaks” but stays hanging, I decided to release only the plastic equipment and finish with the image of my free hanging body.  

Audience engagement and Workshop

I engage with the audience introducing plastic as a game; a multi-shaped material, and as a connector between me as a performer and the audience, and among audience members themselves, creating “dialogical aesthetics” (Grant Kester, 2004, 118). Mach also uses audience engagement each time he cuts off a piece of his trapeze string, creating the illusion of audience responsibility through the buzzer. In reality, he subtly encourages the audience member to activate it.

The audience engagement in SEAFOAM started during the pre-research and creation process in a Workshop I led at the Zirkus Zeit residency at TRAP. What the participants shared after a free writing exercise and the guided movement exploration with plastic not only informed my research but also became part of the performance – through voice recordings, interactions and movement. Some workshop contributions that influences the performance include: the desire to touch and engage with plastic, the sounds it produces, its interconnectivity, its toxicity and associations with jellyfish and toxic storytelling.

Responsibility and dismantling conventions and vulnerability

The audience engagement during the performance is essential for the creation of the stage net design. At the same time, it questions responsibilities and compliance by giving them partial control over the aerial equipment, again dismantling aerial conventions. The audience becomes both potential threats and protectors, mirroring the complexities of our society. Even though audience members are free to act, their actions have consequences, as freedom is entangled with vulnerability (Butler, 2015, 22). I am free to use and destroy a lot of plastic, but I do all that with responsiblity: The plastic I use is mostly recycled, and what I cannot reuse for the next performances I collect to create or document through these pieces.

Intensification and tension building

Thorughout the performance I intensify and build tension to increase the level of vulnerability. I start the performance lying on the ground in a light atmosphere, smiling and playing with the audience. Gradually the intensity of the games, tension and spatial level rise, up to the point of rupture.

Each aerial acrobatics act puts the body of the artist under tension and at risk. I remember clearly why I started to fall in love with aerial acrobatics: it was the adrenaline that kicked in, when learning a new trick or when climbing higher than the day before. Now I must actively seek that adrenaline kick, but that does not minimize the real risk. In fact, the more skilled and advanced I got, the less I perceived risks and the more impactful the injuries could be. I must acknowledge that as an aerialist, I put my body in a vulnerable space, often risking my life. In SEAFOAM not only do I perform aerials, but I also give my audience partial control over the level of risk they put me in. Placing one´s life at risk might be the most vulnerable thing a human being can do to their body.  In circus, specifically in aerial practice, this is controlled risk; in performance it becomes edgework. I do not want to simply increase danger, tension and intensity, but rather allow the audience to feel and control parts of the risk - to experience the consequences and responsibilities of actions. “Edgework is about performance and the fine line between being out of control and harnessing excitement in life and death contexts" (Walby & Stuard, 2021).

Cut piece and Rhythm 0

Numerous artists are working with intensification; Yoko Ono in “Cut Piece” (1965) invites the audience to destroy her clothes or Marina Abramovic´s work "Rhythm 0"(1974), a durational performance with written instructions peaking in the moment an audience member holds a loaded gun to her head. Abramovic puts a well-known weapon on the table, so the stakes are clear. In SEAFOAM the audience is instructed non-verbally through the initial games, and the consequences are explored collectively. Through these games and audience engagement I create space for collective responsibilities.

Compared to these iconic performances I choose an active role whereas Abramovic and Ono stay passive, Abramovic even states “I am the object”. During my research and creation process I explored a more passive role, but I ultimately chose to introduce my audience actively to the stakes of plastic materiality and its impact on the aerial body, whilst I lead the rhythm to allow space for intensification.

Narration and Three Times Left Is Right

Through recorded voice I also create changes in rhythm and structure, leaving space for breath-holding, and intensifying through silence. The narration is deconstructed through fragmentation and layering of language, whilst my agency and live voice are reclaimed.

I was inspired to use fragmented narrative by the theater-performance “Three times left is right” (2025) by Julian Hetzel which I saw at Wiener Festwochen. It starts with a screen and recorded voice stating “This performance contains...” follwed by 15 minutes of keywords that partially contradict themselves. Inspired by this operation including name dropping, fragmented language and associative thinking, I begin my performance with “Once upon a time there was…” introducing Medusa, the myth and the animal, the Little Mermaid and my own story. When I was raped I lost my voice, literally and systemically, like Medusa, like the Mermaid. Through this performance I deconstruct the notion of vulnerability as a survivor of rape by reclaiming my voice. By deconstructing language and meaning, I leave space for audience interpretation, while keeping an emotional distance from my own story.

Vulnerability

In SEAFOAM I explore what it is like to destroy equipment, to resist obeying norms, how collectively we can build and dismantle structures and how Medusa is not only an animal or a story but the vessel to my own reclaiming. I put myself in a vulnerable position on several levels.

It goes without saying that vulnerability is not only physical risk but also

the risk

of not being understood,

of exposing one´s artworks and

of being graded on research.

Dramaturgical operations and concepts and lineages

by Amina Riccetti