Porn & Politics

Stories of lesbian sexual intimacy reflecting on the relation between the act of sex and the act of filming.

venues:

TOP BAR KINO for CINEMA NEXT, Vienna 2018.

Porn Film Festival Vienna. Fortuna Kino, Vienna 2019.

Remembering Pride: Queering the Night, WUK, Vienna 2019

LONG TIME NO SLEEP

In this work the artist talks about love relationships with women, starting with her mother. A bed set in the middle of the space, explores the qualities of it as a place of birth, love, sex, loneliness and death. Surrounded by 3 small TVs that shows stories of love, drama and porn & politics, the visitants are invited to lie down on the bed and choose the story they want to watch.

In this work, the artist reflects on the significant love relationships she has had with women throughout her life, beginning with her mother, who represents her first and greatest love. This intimate exploration is deeply rooted in the context of the queer feminist movement, which informs the artist’s perspective on love, identity, and connection. The 3 videos delve into the complexities of love between women, emphasizing the importance of these relationships in shaping both personal and collective experiences. The narrative traces the profound influence of these connections, highlighting the emotional depth and enduring impact they have had on the artist’s life. Through this lens, it not only celebrates the bonds that define a woman’s life but also resonates as a broader commentary on the power and significance of queer love and feminist solidarity.

Videos made in collaboration with the filmmaker Nika Saravanja.

Each video has around 10 minutes.

Venues:

2019: Group Exhibition “Home Sweet Home” in the frame of BIENALSUR, Buenos Aires, Argentina curated by Fernando Farina & Florencia Battiti  2018: Academy of Fine Arts Vienna.

Is there love in Berlin? Partcipatory Lecture Performance

“When we love we can make our hearts speak.” #bellhooks

Based on bell hooks’ book All About Love, Is There Love in Berlin? is a participatory lecture performance that delves into the complexities of love and friendships in the city, particularly focusing on the immigrant population. Through this lecture, Camila invites the audience to reflect on love, humanity, and the universal need to be part of a community, exploring these themes through personal discussions.

After collecting love stories from local residents and historical narratives from the city, documented through audio recordings, photos, videos, and writings, the artist created a multimedia collage that forms the structure of the lecture performance. In total, it lasts 90 minutes, with a 20-minute pause. During the pause, the audience can also participate by sharing their own stories and thoughts, responding to a questionnaire inspired by the themes explored during the research process.

  1. Did you ever have a story of love in Berlin? If yes, did you suffer from the racism of your partner? Or had you ever been racist with your partner?
  2. Do you have friends in Berlin that you love?
  3. Is there love in Berlin?

The project began in 2017 as part of the B-Tour Festival, curated by Yael Sherril. The premiere was so well-attended that it led to an additional presentation at the festival. Later that year, the project was also invited to be featured at the Amerika-Gedenkbibliothek as part of the “Aktion Offener Sonntag” program, curated by Sonntagsbureau.

Once again, the space was filled with an engaged audience.

Moments from the lecture-performance can be viewed here:

Berlin, 2017

A wonderful event, wholeheartedly thought and beautifully presented. You can feel the words coming out of Camila’s heart, and right into your own. Sehr zu empfehlen!!  M. Haten Hamdy

2017 B-Tour Festival, Berlin, Germany, curated by Yael Sherril.
2017 Amerika Gedenk-bibliothek, part of the program 'Aktion offener Sonntag`, curated by Sonntagsbureau.
At the Amerika-Gedenkbibliothek in Berlin, as part of Sonntagsbureau, 2017

Is There Love in Berlin? consistently drew large audiences. Here is the link to the Facebook event and the 2K people who attended:
https://www.facebook.com/events/152207042083792/

HOPE

Using an audio in conjunction with a video which doesn’t have any image, Camila Rhodi combines a text spoken in a gripping voice with a continuous black screen. This confluence of audio and blank visual invites the audience in a natural way to create their own images in their mind.

VENUES

2016:  Viena Contemporary. curated by Olaf Stüber – Vienna. Austria.          2018: Deviation Festival ACUD, curated by Musterzimmer Gallery – Berlin, Germany          CINEMA NEXT, GartenBaum Kino – Vienna, Austria

The Ethical Slut

Multimedia Performance, a pocket karaoke concert. 

The performance is based on stories of physical and psychological violence towards women from all over the world. The artist takes the audience on a journey starting from the slum music from Brazil passing by some feminist, and queer pop songs.

The public display of intimate life details, fighting for the female sexuality deconstructing patriarchal structures of power and oppression, using the aesthetics of the ‘personal is political’ to the artistic practice as a method for empowerment.

–> this video is an edited documentation with also some comments in order to understand better how the Ethical Slut multimedia performance works:

(The whole performance takes around 30 minutes)

*Thanks to Beatriz Provasi, Flávia Naves, Mirabella Dziruni, Miss G (Giorgia Conceição), Samantha Rennó, Rodrigo Garcia Alves and Felix Speiser.

VENUES

2017: Chouftouhonna Feminist Festival. Tunis, Tunisia.

2016: Mash-up! – Multigender /Multiworld. Ballhaus Naunynstrasse.  Berlin, Germany 

Collaborative Works

2020: The Book of S of I : Creatures born from Hopelessness

Another world, post-apocalypse. Feverish nightmares turning into utopian dreams. Bodies aligned in pleasure, summoning the ghosts of the past and the future. Give yourself into the world of The Book of S of I – a queer feminist sci-fi Saga about the desire to belong, about the power of mutual care, of bodily pleasures, and the yearning for tenderness.

The Book of S of I. Chapter One: Creatures born from Hopelessness is the first part of the trilogy.

The premiere of the film on June 13th. 2020 on the homepage of the Haus der Kulturen der Welt as part of the New Alphabet School # 4 Caring symposium
hkw.de

The film was created with the support of the M.1 Arthur Boskamp Foundation and the sponsorship award.

A Film by Malu Blume

2019: Beyound Vision

What happens when our vision cedes and we cannot experience our surrounding the way we did before? Are the remaining senses sharpened? Does reality blur?
Beyond Vision is a binaural one-to-one performance on Tempelhofer Feld. Blindfolded and wearing headphones, let yourself be guided by the hands of an invisible companion. Together you embark on a journey into the unknown. You will find yourself in dreamlike situations and discover the invisible and the intangible. The experience leads you gently and safely through your inner images, different feelings and states of being. It is an invitation to let yourself fall into uncertainty, to trust, to give in, to be touched, and yet be entirely with yourself.

Commissioned by B_Tour
in the context of Tracks in a Box.

Guidance: Shelley Etkin, Camila Rhodi
Voices: Shelley Etkin, Charlotte Happe
Thanks to Klara Pfeiffer

Photos © Joana Dias
Tempelhofer Feld, Berlin, 2019

https://ilonamarti.com/Beyond-Vision

2018: Logistics of Loneliness in collaboration with  Marja Christians. Rough Proposals, Mousonturm, Frankfurt

2016 : Walking with Ghosts in collaboration with Ghost Cinema

In the 1920’s, Filmstadt Weißensee, the now almost forgotten area in northern Berlin was once the city’s cultural hotspot. Stars like Marlene Dietrich and Fritz Lang were there, at Calagariplatz and on the Gustav-Adolf Straße, which at that time was lined with bright lights and 20 cinema houses. Among the finest and most popular of these was the former silent-movie theater Delphi. Direct on Caligariplatz, this relic rests like a hidden jewel, unrecognizable from the outside, and practically unknown to most Berliners. The theater miraculously survived WWII, and remained closed during GDR times. In fact, the theater has remained closed to the general public since the war, and remains so today. This building was one of the first cinemas of its size in the world, and the original interior of this former 870 seat theater remains intact. It is one of the best remaining examples of the glamour and flair of this important cultural era- the heyday of German silent film.

Directed by Paola Barreto
Videoperformance ( audiovisual editing + live projections/ mapping ) : Moana Mayall

Parangotela  performance: Camila Rhodi

2015: Fluids” – a 2015 reinvention of Allan Kaprow’s happening from 1967.  Artist Alexandra Pirici

kaprowinberlin.smb.museum/en/

This version of Kaprow’s “Fluids” operates a change of material: from ice-blocks to the assemblage of the human body. The new work attempts to re-address and re-position itself in relation to some of the issues the original work tackled with – the medium of sculpture, the concept of monument, temporality, participation, production of collectivity – while also considering the human body as medium and the materiality of “immaterial” performative works and their economy at a time of a (second) “performative turn” in the visual arts. It also attempts a more abstract way of being in common – the participants building themselves into a 9 meters long, 3 meters wide structure instead of building an exterior object, thus reflecting on the effects of today’s immaterial labour (in affluent societies) as opposed to the former dynamics of the industrial age and the factory floor.
The living, sounding sculpture “melted” away from 12 to 8 p.m. in Potsdamer platz.

curated by Lisa Marei Schmidt and Udo Kittelmann                                               production: Hannes Frey
participants: Ferre Naima, Valerie Renay, Zuzanna Ratajczyk, Paul Walker, Jozefiens Beckers, Reza Mirabi, Juan Gabriel Harcha, Julia Illmer, Josephine Findeisein, Marc Carrera, Annekatrin Kiesel, Amit Goldenberg, Miriam Kongstad, Maria Ferrara, Iam Campigotto, Helen Follert, Kathrin Knopfle, Jasmin Ihrac, Gregori Homa, Katarzyna Guzowska, Jolika Poulopoulou, Darcy Wallace, Julia Jadkowski, Ana Mrdjanov, Leonie Nadler, Jana Kruger, Carina Erdmann, Sura Hertzberg, Ralph Klein, Annette Zander, Alice Heyward, Yuca Meubrink, Viviana Druga, Rene Ricarda Vollhardt, Edith Buttingsrud Pedersen, Carlos Kong, Emily Ranford, Thomas Mielmann, Tobias Kluge, Corinne Schlichting, Lenine Guevara, Martha Hincapié Charry, Andrei Barza, Rachell Clark, Tatiana Heide, Laura von Raffay, David Loscher, Neele Ruckdeschel, Sven Hermans, Frida Yngvesson, Hanna Nordqvist, Giulia Heder, Sarah Bouars, Maddy White, Miha Jensterle, Rebekka Böhme, Pedro Vieira da Costa Filho, Juliane Dames, Jessica Kammerer, Paul Riemann, Eva Rozalia Tankó, Judica Albrecht, Lola Lustosa, Camila Rhodi, Dmitriy Povernov, Benjamin Egger, Uwe Zimmermann, Sarah Berger, Marie Zwinzscher, Sophie Camille Brunner, Anton Rose

commissioned by Nationalgalerie – Berlin in the frame of Stadt/Bild, Berlin Art Week

2015: ‘I am not a feminist but’  in collaboration with Makiko Yamamoto for Liquid Architecture . Melbourne . Austrália 

This work was produced in collaboration with Japanese artist Makiko Yamamoto. Rhodi co-developed a performance piece to accompany Yamamoto’s 12 minute audio piece filled with the single sentence,  ‘I’m not a feminist but…’. Yamamoto reads the sentence out loud with different distortions in speed, tone, and volume.  Together both artists made the video performance.

i 'm not feminist but 1i'm not feminist but Melbournei'm not melbourne 1i'm not Melbourne 2

2013 No Parking

Solo site specific performance about home for the master project of Jasmin Assade at Freie Universität Berlin.

2012

U-bahn Antigone in collaboration with Yaell Sherill

Live Performance for steinum knitwear for Berlin Fashion Week, Berlin, Germany

A possibility to love

Inspired by the work of french 1970s fashion photographer Guy Bourdin, I made the video installation ‘A possibility to love’ as a transcription of one of the his pictures. I used my own image as an alive doll projected inside a gift box to build a body sculpture waiting for someone to ‘pick her up’. This doll is static and alive. She has thoughts, takes breath and has desires. Through an audio, the audience may hears privately her wishes.

Muster Zimmer

                                           BERLIN. 24TH OF AUGUST 2013.

Do you wanna talk about it?

Live Performance
Do U Wanna Talk About It? – Live Performance It is an intimate and deeply personal performance. Set in a private room, one member of the audience enters alone, taking a seat directly across from the artist. In this secluded space, the spectator is invited to gaze into the profound depths of the artist’s past experiences.

This autobiographical performance confronts the difficult subject of childhood sexual abuse, with the artist courageously sharing her own history of trauma. The encounter is intensely private, designed for just one spectator at a time, and lasts for a brief but powerful four minutes.

Do U Wanna Talk About It? challenges the boundaries between performer and audience, creating a moment of profound connection and reflection on the impact of trauma.

vídeo em português
VENUES
Bärenzwinger Kommunalle Gallerie . Berlin . 2024
One Billion Rising  – Tanz Quartier . Vienna . Austria . 2016 (video)
Unruly Bodies – gender norms resistance . Sophia Conference – Brussels .  2015
Kunstahaus Rhenania – Cologn. Germany .  2015
100˚Grade Festival – Sophiensaelle and Hebbel am Uffer – Berlin. 2014
Month of Performance Berlin . PIC_Pieces in Chain. Altes Finanzamt 2013
Musterzimmer. Berlin. 2013
Camila Rhodi: Der Tagesspiegel
Do u wanna talk about it blog 100˚Berlin

Long time no sex (video)

Drops of love affairs experiences are written in red letters on a toilet paper. Beside the distortion of the song Je T’aime moi non plus, the work is a mix of erotic, funny and ironic random stories.  The public display of intimate life details, with a non-fear of confronting sexual ethics, gender norms, and the tyranny of political correctness inspired by the so-called sex-positive feminist art. Fighting for the female sexuality deconstructing patriarchal structures of power and oppression, using the aesthetics of the ‘personal is political’ to the artistic practice as a method for empowerment.

It is a mixture of the funny, erotic and ironic stories of love affairs written in red on a toilette paper. 

Berlin, 2012.

pic-3-over-18-only

VENUES 

2019: Porn Film Festival Berlin/ Luzia, Berlin, Germany

2018: Confraria Vermelha Confraria de Mulheres, Porto, Portugal/ ‘Come as u are’ by Curated by Girls, st. George, Berlin, Germany

2016: Tunis International Feminist Art Festival Chouftohoma, Tunis, Tunísia              

2015:  Ehemaliges StummfilmKino Delphi Berlin, Germany.                          

2014:  Parallel Program of Manifesta 10. by Sale Festival. Saint Petersburg, Russia.        

2013:  Sale Video Screening. Market Square, Cambridge/ Female Project. ARTicle Gallery. Birminghan. UK./Art.moment. Moscow, Russia.

2012: Home Base Berlin, Germany.

Over 18 only (video installation)

 

 

OVER 18 ONLY is a two- channel video installation that draws a parallel between the artist’s love affairs and her childhood experience of sexual abuse. Set in an intimate, confined space, the work centers around a bed. The visitor is invited to lie down on a bed, becoming  part of the immersive experience. Above them, the first video, Long Time No Sex, a 7-minute playful video in which the artist writes about her fisrt year in Berlin on a toilet paper, is projected onto the ceiling, while a mixed and distorted soundtrack, based on Serge Gainsbourg‘s Je T’aime plays through headphones.

Following this, a second video, Over 18 Only  plays on a small TV monitor beside the pillow. This 3-minute video focuses on the artist’s childhood sexual abuse, introducing a contrasting layer to the performance. This video installation blends the humorous, erotic, and ironic stories of love affairs in a new new city chosen to live, written in red on toilet paper, with the serious black and white narrative of violence. This randomness, along with the contrasting themes and a mixed and distorted soundtrack, evokes a complex emotional experience.  

Long time no sex (video)

Over 18 Only (video)

The installation Over 18 Only combines the use of an installation comprised of two videos constructing the illusion of a private space, in a exhibition frame. The one-to-one audience is invited to dive in an atmosphere of intimacy, lying on the bed to watch the stories of a woman who looks for love and sex as a survivor of sexual violence when a child.

 

Venues (the whole video installation)

2017: Academy of Fine Arts Vienna. Vienna, Austria

2013:  100˚ Grade Festival. Sophiensaele. Berlin, Germany.

           15th Art and Media Biennale. Wroclaw, Poland.

           Month of Performance. Altes Finanzamt. Berlin, Germany.

           Musterzimmer Gallery. Berlin. Germany

2012: HB Berlin. Berlin, Germany.

          Agora. Berlin, Germany.

sophiensaele

100˚ Grade. HAU/ Sophiensaele Festival. Berlin 2013.

projeção

100˚ Grade. HAU/ Sophiensaele Festival. Berlin 2013.

wro 1

WRO 15th Media Art Biennale 2013

wro 4

wro 2

Over 18 Only (video)

 

The video shows the past memories of the same non-fictional woman in her childhood. This time the viewer gets in contact with the details of sexual abuse experienced by a child at home. ‘Home for me has never really meant safeness’

A black and white serious story of violence.

 

still-over-18-only