OIKOS | Silvia Mai

Concept and form by Silvia Mai
curated by Anna Paola Bacalov
action by Silvia Mai and Eco, Chiara Marolla, and Molpè
video image by Ivan Gasbarrini
winning project of the 2024 Tuttoteatro.com “Dante Cappelletti” Award
co-production by Tuttoteatro.com
executive production by Tecnologia Filosofica (Turin)
with the support of IntercettAzioni – Lombardy Artistic Residency Center / Theater, delle Moire (Milan), and ORA-Orobie Artistic Residencies (Piateda-Sondrio), Lavanderia a Vapore (Collegno-Turin), BTT Balletto Teatro di Torino, Dello Scompiglio Cultural Association (Capannori-Lucca), Bianco Teatro/Ti con Zero (Bracciano-Rome)
thanks to Fernanda Pessolano, Enrico Fabris

Eco, from the Greek Oikos “the house”, is a dog. In the relationship between two beings who make a home for each other, work finds its origin, its foundation. The boundary between what is properly human and what is not, between those who care and those who are cared for, between those who look and those who are looked at, is revealed to be fragile and labile. In this border, which questions and breaks down every form and formality – and in the intimacy of the skin – lies the principle of every possible encounter. How much is it possible to bring to light what happens in the shadows as a secret? Can the “home” be revealed to another glance, without the risk of getting lost or hiding? What can come to us beyond the fall, from this inevitable exposure? What words are needed to get closer to the heart? What is the path to follow or trace? Nourished by these questions, the work moves between the skin and an inexorable distance, physical and soul.

Silvia Mai is a dancer, mountain shepherd, art therapist in training. His studies in the artistic field were marked by his encounters with Raffaella Giordano, Silvia Rampelli, Dominique Dupuy, Claudia Dias, Anna Paola Bacalov. A fter a few years of artistic silence, during which he learned and practiced the life of a shepherd, he resumed his artistic research in the field of movement and the plastic arts. In autumn 2021 he is a guest of Laterale for Danae Festival with Prospettive Animali, designed together with the dogs Gringo and Eco. In September 2023 he began training in Anthroposophical Art Therapy at the European Cinabro in Milan and in 2025 he enrolled in the two-year master’s course in Painting at the Albertina Academy in Turin. She is currently involved in the creation of SONO, a performance work composed of four chapters in collaboration with Anna Paola Bacalov, Chiara Marolla, Alice Berni, Enrico Fabris. The study of the first Oikos/SONO chapter, dedicated to the relationship with animals, is the winner of the 2024 Dante Cappelletti Award.