Giovanni Muro (F1c) The Theatre of the World - Tuesday, 19th February 1980, Venice ; part 3- “Suite Venitienne”

Giovanni Muro ; “The Presence of the Past” - 19.02.1980, Venice “These assemblages have mixtures of sites and scenes , constituent parts of a moment of viewing...by the mind ... if not the immediate viewing of the eye”- Jean Dubuffet; the Theatres of Memory series of paintings,1976-1979. Part 3: Suite Venetienne “It’s no fun to hang around Feelin' that same old way No fun to hang around Freaked out For another day No fun, my babe No fun No fun, my babe No fun No fun to be alone Walking by myself No fun to be alone In love With nobody else” The Stooges- No Fun. Having parted from Giulia and Giovanni , Giorgio’s immediate plan had been to seek out the Spanish performers who had been up on the Rialto all week, but the crowds were incredible, most of whom were idling in the vicinity in advance of the evening party that was to take place in Saint Mark’s Piazza in a few hours time . So , to try and find a clearer path, he veered off the Calle that he was on, that would have taken him past the Goldoni statue and then straight to the bridge, and, instead, headed off in the opposite direction towards Campo Santa Maria Formosa. Somewhat perversely ,despite the damp , cold air he left his coat unbuttoned, so that his jumper and the collar of his shirt were exposed, but not his tee-shirt underneath. Emblazoned with the word “Rational” across its front , Giorgio had had it since buying it while on a trip to the States in his late teens . If asked he’d have said that he still wore it regularly as a conscious homage to Iggy Pop and his cameo role in the late ‘60’s promotional film for Nico’s song “ Evening of Light” , the final track on her second album, called ”The Marble Index” and, more obliquely , the musicians Ron Asheton, the guitarist who powered the Stooges early sound and John Cale, who produced and arranged Nico’s album. However , a decade on and come the Summer ,when he would often wear the teeshirt on its own ,few would pick up on the connection and , if anything, were more likely to mistakenly believe it to be a Jenny Holzer or Barbara Kruger inspired slogan. But while wearing it next to his skin made him feel transgressively “right on” and , at times, to appear , perhaps inadvertently, seductively edgy, it might also have been that it had become for Giorgio one of those fabric items that ,as with so many children, he clung to for continuity, reassurance and security. Seen in this way, Giorgio’s layers of clothing were perhaps akin to the growth rings of trees, as explored and exposed by the subtractive works of Giuseppe Pennone, the textured, resilient outer layers protecting the youthful and vulnerable ones , hidden beneath. Everywhere that week in Venice people seemed to have cameras, but despite the incongruity of his white “bauta” mask and his woollen, panelled lumber jacket, he did not seem to attract their attention. Entering the Campo, Giorgio skirted around the bell tower of Santa Maria Formosa. For a moment he thought about circling round and sitting down on the steps of the small bridge that led to the entrance to Querini Stampalia, but the wind swirling around the open space made him think again. Giorgio crossed the campo and continued northwards via Calle Lunga Santa Formosa, Calle Cicogna and then Calle Bessana towards Campo SS Giovanni e Paolo. Entering Calle Lunga he finally succumbed and put his hands in his coat pockets. Despite the numbness of his fingers he felt a small, hard object deep in the corner of his right pocket. Using the nail of his forefinger he dislodged it and, after pushing up his mask a bit, put it in his mouth. Scuola Sant Marco and Campo San Zanipolo were not only their usual grimy selves, but the campo was also exposed and benchless, so Giorgio decided to continue on to the Rialto bridge , where he’d either find the Catalan performers or he’d cross over to his apartment. The numbness of his hands had eased but a different type of numbness was now transmitting itself via his arteries to his body at large. There seemed to be an impossible distance between his head and his feet, connected by a nothingness, while the air seemed to be speckled with the tiniest ,most intense, dots. Words formed in his mouth but he did not speak. Some minutes later Giorgio found himself on Fondamenta Van Axel, on the junction with Calle Castelli. He paused and looked down the canal and then up into the clear blue sky, his arms outstretched, his mask making him look like an ancient Greek actor remonstrating with the Gods. The winter sun , that had been eclipsed to the South just a few days previously was too low on the horizon to be seen, but it was not that that Giorgio was searching for. Giorgio loved this spot , for from the imaginary aerial vantage point of Jacopo de Barbari’s wood-block map of Venice of 1500 , somewhere up there beyond Giudecca, you could imagine the cartographer looking down onto this very point all those years ago, as if it was today. You could even still see the wooden door of Palazzo Soranzo behind him that Barbari had carefully picked out. It was just approaching 4.00 and as Giovanni and Giulia were entering the Teatro del Mondo by the Dogana, a man and a woman , both in their late twenties, approached Giorgio. They each had cameras. The woman, dressed in a white trench coat and dark, round- brimmed hat, asked if they could take his photograph. Giorgio agreed, whereupon the woman gave way to the man , who wore a jacket and scarf. His Italian was poor but as Giorgio did not speak French, and at that moment was barely capable of speech at all, they made do in a sort of pantomime. The man asked Giorgio to stand some twenty metres away from ,and with his back to , the palazzo and to place his left hand on the iron railing that ran straight alongside the canal ,exactly at the point that it bent outwards to form part of the bridge that was just in front of him, which he did. Then the man, bending from the waist, photographed him and while he did so the woman photographed them both. They spoke hurriedly in French. The woman laughed, which was a mistake , and Giorgio, finding the whole thing unsettling and feeling that a line had been crossed, made to move forward. Despite Giorgio’s clear intention to leave the man put his arm out and asked for another pose . Giorgio refused , shaking him away before setting off down the path ,following a well dressed man in a dark coat and hat, self-conscious, isolated and frustrated with himself. Several days later Giorgio recounted this episode to Giovanni as they sat at their usual table in Paolo’s bar, as a pre-amble to explaining how he’d been caught up in a scuffle a little while later between a group of tourists and revellers dressed up as characters from “A clockwork orange” and a policeman . He had various cuts and grazes on one side of his face , like the portrayed figures had in Paolo Ventura’s series of over-painted photographs called “ ex voto”, and complained that his ribs were hurting him. The balls of his feet were constantly tapping the floor, up and down, while his fingers ceaselessly thrummed the table top ,as if in his mind he was playing an obdurate harmonium or trying to portray “Music” by Luigi Russolo in a game of charades. It was obvious to Giovanni that Giorgio was in a bad way, far more vulnerable than the abrasions might suggest. “Come over to ours and we’ll get you cleaned up” he said ,his hands reaching across the table to gently cup Giorgio’s and looking intently into his eyes. Some minutes later the two of them rose from their seats , Giorgio somewhat gingerly. Giovanni pulled back the table and helped Giorgio on with his jacket. The jukebox had been fixed and Bowie’s Life on Mars filled the bar , but mercifully did not follow them out of the door. They had never been closer nor more apart. ..................................... In the Summer of ‘83, a few months after Giorgio’s death ( see Giovanni Muro, P.2; a last visit to Casella’s), Giulia returned from another trip to Paris and brought back for Giovanni a copy of Sophie Calle’s Suite Venitienne. It had just been published and Calle was very much of the moment in fashionable Parisian circles, although barely known elsewhere. Giulia hoped that the mix of photographs and faux-narrative ,along with the Venetian setting , would intrigue him. It was a work of modest size, made up largely of grainy, low resolution black and white photographs, ostensibly taken in Venice in mid February 1980, albeit that it made no reference, visually or in the text, to either the Carnival or the theatrical Biennale , documenting her fictionalised stalking of a man who was the subject of her claimed obsession. Giovanni held the book in his hands , slowly turning the pages as Giulia watched, pleased that the gift appeared to have been a success. Then suddenly, silently and without warning Giovanni’s jaw tightened and his whole face became taut and wan. He leant back, placing the open book on the table, his eyes moist and inward looking. “Hey, whatever’s the matter” she said, reaching out her arms to him. They looked down together at the book.The double page ,now facing-up towards them , did not bear any text but only black and white images, including that of a man, leaning forward, taking a photograph of a masked figure in a panelled coat in front of Palazzo Soranzo on Fondamenta Von Axel on a wintry day, his hand resting on the adjacent railing. “It’s Giorgio, back from the dead”.