About The Show
"Are you morally so old-fashioned as to regard female vanity as frivolous?"
This is how Helen Palmer questions her readers about the importance of keeping vanity up to date. Helen is the pseudonym of Clarice Lispector, a Ukrainian writer naturalized Brazilian who used her column in several newspapers to give beauty and femininity tips to women all around the country. The issues raised by Clarice at the time come against the annoyances of Gio Mielle, a Brazilian actress based in NY since 2015.
It is 2018 and feminism, a subject in constant evidence, still leads Gios imaginary to an obsessive interest about her universe as a woman. She finds herself bothered with issues that do not match with her own idea of a woman's place in the world today. Why, despite struggling to make every women know her power and her uniqueness, I still look in the mirror and find myself bothered by a new line that appears on my face?
Perhaps Aphrodite, Goddess of love and beauty, was responsible for creating the first frame of femininity. The figure of a woman coming out of her shell, hair traversing the body, an image full of sensuality and mystery. The goddess who is far from being human, but who finds in the common people the mirror of desperation of who wants to be like her. Is it human to seek perfection? Is human the search for the ideal body, the angelic face, the smooth skin? The humanity of imperfect human-being leads to a kind of inhumanization when it gets to the constant attempt to perfect itself. Human-perfect-inhuman, should that be the goal in a womens life?
What to do with the bombardment of images, products, advertisements that crosses us daily trying to make us need more to be the woman they require me to be - and that we often still try to be. The lines bother, the routines of beauty are still part of the day to day and the discomfort is constant when most women think about what others see on them. Who are these women who live a plastic life, who exaggerate in beauty products, who do all sorts of procedure in the desperation of being as perfect as the model of the magazine. And how much do I have of them? Lines, they bother.
Gio presents a show that touches these subjects sometimes in a personal way, others in a critical, ironic and reflexive way, always bringing to the scene the physical theater that is characteristic of her work as an actress. The text is based on the articles by Helen Palmer - Clarice Lispector - printed in the columns and feminine supplements of the Brazilian press during the 50s and 60s.
From hypocrisy to exposure, this is the result of Gio Mielles own discomfort with the lines that make her the woman she is today.
About The Company
Nettles Artists Collective is a NYC-based artists collective run by two Latinas, Debora Balardini and Sandie Luna. We imbue the American art scene with authentic, global voices and multidisciplinary collaborations by providing a platform for the performing and visual arts. As visual and performance artists moving and creating together, Nettles has been devising original works using physical theater and visual arts for the past twelve years forging leadership and amplification of inclusion in the arts.
About The Artist
Gio Mielle
Gio Mielle is an actress, theatre producer and a collaborator at Nettles Artists Collective. In 2003, she won an award for best actress for her role in The Cannibal which set her off to hold many other roles around her native Brazil. She also performed at Galpão Cine Horto: Arriscamundo, Midsummer Night's Dream and Rehearsing Lies. In New York, Gio was part of Sorry Robot, a Mike Iveson's project for Elevator Repair Service, she performed at the Nettles Artists' The Dark Side of the Woods and at the Sister Sylvester's The Maids' The Maids. Her latest work was at the critic choice Doomocracy, which gave her a nomination to the International Brazilian Press Award 2017.
Debora Balardini
Debora is one of the co-founders and co-Artistic Directors of Nettles Artists Collective, which has received multiple nominations for original work such as Apple of My Eye (Menina dos Meus Olhos), the first professionally produced original piece written and performed by an artist with Down syndrome. Debora has directed various solo and ensemble pieces including Meu Vazio é o Movimento written by Alan Rosa, Inside.Not Looking Out.- A Movement Piece with Nettles Artists Collective, The Serpent and Infinite While It Lasts with Group .BR., NY's only Brazilian theater company, for which she is one of the Co-Founders and Executive Director. She is the co-founder of PUNTO Space, a venue for events, art happenings and performances that serves as a creative home and place for artistic community to collaborate, explore and thrive. Debora is a member and supporter of Actors Fund, Yoga Alliance, Americans for the Arts, Manhattan Chamber of Commerce, Brazilian Chamber of Commerce, Brazilian Endowment for the Arts, the League of Professional Theater Women and she was a Brazilian International Press Award 2017 Best Actress nominee for Inside the Wild Heart, which she co-created, co-produced and performed in. Debora is also a 2017 SheROCKS Art Innovators of the Year Award honoree. She can be seen in IR TV, Industry Rules, The Miami Herald, The Story Exchange, Cheapism, Trendy Trippin', Mushaka's Motivational Monday/Huffington Post blog, HowlRound Online Journal, On Deck with Lucy and Business News Daily.