Shapeshifting

Shapeshifting is a natural thing. As we live our bodies grow through transformations, not necessarily always for the better, even our smell changes. The Japanese have a name for it: Kareishū or the smell of old people. Many animals go through much more radical changes, some step out of their skins with a completely new set of tentacles, some change sex and in the end we all become liquid.

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For this Aromatheque edition, Livia Rita joins us to explore the notion, and perhaps the necessity, of Shapeshifting. At the heart of her practice lies the art of transformation: transforming into creatures that exist beyond the human. Livia crafts more-than-human identities animated by courage, softness, and wild intuition. Her ArtFashion and wearable sculptures become skins for these beings, merging body, gender, and nature into ever-evolving forms.

About Aromathéque

Every month olfactory artist Frank Bloem curates a program where experts, artists, designers and scientists shift our perspectives on what we eat, drink, touch, inhale, secrete and smell. These so called "lower senses" are not only placed lower in our body but also were considered through history as lesser, more banal and not sophisticated. We think differently. Starting from a simple theme with a thought provoking question, we go on a journey and inviting people from different disciplines to discover the world that lies behind everyday phenomena.

Frank Bloem

Frank Bloem is an artist who uses scent as his primary medium. He started his lab The Snifferoo in 2016 and creates scent art projects. From elephant scents for Artis Zoo to erotic pine scents for festival Into the great wide Open. He works with artist and museums and has a long term collaboration with The Embassy of the North Sea for who he made art projects and a perfume. For Mediamatic Frank has been active since 2017. From Collaborating on Odorama evenings with Caro Verbeek to giving scent and distillation workshops. Since 2019 he is the manager of the Aroma Lab that he set up together with Niklaus Metler.

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Presentation about different body smells and smell samples from the elephant intimate body parts. -

With: Frank Bloem

Livia Rita

Livia Rita is an alpine-born artist, performer, and self-described “soft nature creature,” moving between the Alps and London. Her practice blends music, performance, and visual worlds into immersive, ritual-like experiences where fantasy and reality dissolve. Through shapeshifting identities, ecological imaginaries, and sensual soundscapes, she invites audiences into spaces of transformation, intimacy, and collective becoming.

Information

Thursday 2nd of April
19:30 - 21:00
Ticket: €12,50
Student, kunstenaar, Stadspas: €8,50

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