AES+F, The Feast of Trimalchio (2009-2010) Con qualche annotazione sulla serenità delle immagini delle civiltà antiche

This article is a review of the video artwork Feast of Trimalchio, the second part of the Liminal Space Trilogy realised by AES+F. The Feast of Trimalchio is a clear reference to the Satyricon by Petronius, book XV, narrating the Coena Trimalchionis. The feast is rendered in Camp Style, but there are similarities with the code of representation of banquets invented by Paolo Veronese in XVI cent. and continued in the XVIII cent. by Tiepolo. The brunch proposed by AES+F show impossibile paradises that correspond to a phase of refeudalisation of the European society. The term “splendor” – as intended by Focault (in Surveiller et punir) – is an explicit revelation of truth and power, or better of the truth of power. The proposal of this article is to intend the “splendor” of AES+F also in the sense of serenity of artwork (Huizinga) and in the relation city-theatre (Lotman): a “serene” and perhaps “festive” representation of the sorrow that takes place in it.