LOVELY-RATZ

Bio
Linda Pietrobelli (2001) and Ambra Zamengo (2002) are currently pursuing their Bachelor's degree in Multimedia Arts at IUAV University of Venice. In 2023, they formed the collective “LOVELY-RATZ”, born from the desire to work together, engaging with the dimension of “the other” and considering it as necessary for the development of thought.

Statement
By combining performance and photography in the analysis of human dynamics—with a particular focus on interpersonal relationships and social roles—their artistic research seeks to privilege queer and transfeminist perspectives, placing people at the center of both the artistic project and the work itself. They intertwine aesthetics and conceptual inquiry to create spaces for dialogue and reflection, fostering empathetic connections.
Their artistic practice builds visual and theoretical connections through performative practices and bodily gestures: through these, they explore how the body interacts with its surrounding space, reinterpreting and shaping the environment through itself and its own perception.
In the pursuit of a pre-practical emotional dialogue, their interest lies in understanding relational dynamics through a psychological and anthropological approach, which allows them to explore and communicate the complexities of places, individuals, and communities. From this arises their interest in connecting territory, nature, and people through expressive means such as photography, performance, and other artistic media.

Reverse gaze

2023

Group exhibition “FARE”, Laboratorio di Arti visive 1 (held by Diego Tonus with the collaboration of Daniele Zoico), IUAV University of Venice. Photo credits: Marco Reghelin
Reverse gaze is a performative practice that reflects on the power dynamics that arise when a woman is subjected to the male gaze, and explores how such dynamics can influence her representation.
The term "male gaze" was first introduced in 1975 by Laura Mulvey, one of the foremost figures in feminist film criticism. In her essay "Visual Pleasure and Narrative Cinema" (L. Mulvey, Screen, 16, 6-18., 1975), she highlights how most traditional cinema was made to please heterosexual male voyeurism, objectifying female figures and relegating them to passive non-actors secondary to active male characters.

The practice seeks to analyze how the male gaze operates when it is forced to act. The artist invites different men to her home and each one of them is tasked with capturing her in a chosen pose with an analog camera.
The subsequent instruction is to depict her in the same pose; however, the artist retains agency throughout all the process, freely moving to alter the men's perspectives, restricting their movements, and influencing their actions. Every technique they use to draw the artist is controlled by her, and is characterized by a specific modus operandi, aimed at altering the normal course of actions.
The final outcome consists of mixed-media drawings portraying the artist created by the men involved, accompanied by the artist’s portrait they took. The male gaze is further filtered by the camera lens, creating an additional detachment between his perception and the image presented in the photograph. The men involved seek to immortalize their own perception of the artist both through photography and through drawing, yet both are influenced by the camera and by the constraints and the rules imposed by the artist herself.
This reversal of power draws the attention to the complex interplay between representation, vulnerability and control.

print on photographic paper 10 x 15 cm / coffee, pencil, sanguine, black pen on paper 33 x 48 cm