This video is a document-compendium of four workshops led Marcel•li in Italy, Spain and Portugal between 1996 and 1997. However, in some ways, the piece goes beyond being a mere register of a series of actions, as these overlap and connect as if the argument and cast was one and the same throughout. Thus we have a kind of “comedy of excess”, that on the one hand reminds us of the precursory performances of the Viennese actionists, and on the other, refers us back to Antúnez’s previous itinerary as founding member of the collectives La Fura dels Baus and Los Rinos. At the same time, this video anticipates both latent and germinal ideas of later projects.

The video is structured like a myth whose narration is conceptually broken down into four parts: (1) “La Quimera” / “The Chimaera”, with scenes of hypnosis, catalepsy, monstrous nightmares and orgiastic rituals; (2) “El Parto” / “The Birth”, which has a “gore” like tone, but without abandoning a spirit that lies somewhere between the burlesque, the festive, the offensive and parody; (3) “El Golem” / “The Golem”, in which the filthy simulacrum reaches its paroxysm around a table well stocked with foodstuff - among “battered bodies, false coituses, milk baths and orgasmic screams”, as well as with a more abrupt montage; (4) “La inmolación” / “The immolation”, which comprises an act of purification, a blood-and-fire sacrifice and the proem to the final feast.

The piece seems to record both the development of each of the four workshops (which lasted two weeks each), featuring performances specifically done for the camera, and the final public presentation of each of the pieces, which took place within the institutional context that sponsored and housed each of the workshops: Centro Teatrale La Corte Ospitale de Rubiera, Reggio Emilia, June 1995; Mostra de Teatre de LLeida, October 1996; Festival Atlántico de Lisboa, May 1997; and Festival Inteatro de Polverigi, July 1997.