LaaLa LaLaaaa La LaaLaLaaa A Moment And A Song

The work is composed of an installation and a sound piece placed in a room of Maison Descartes, former Institut français of Amsterdam and a singing performance taking place from the entrance door of the opposite house. “I was born at the bottom of a gone ocean. Those hills were – at the dawn of time – submerged by a vast sea. Shells and fossils still appear sometimes at the surface as unexpected gems testifying to a remote but certain past. Humans have been anchored to those lands by a silent bond, a visceral connection to those dried up waves of water from which it all comes from. Peasant hands went through eras paying tribute to the vanished abyss with the saltiness of sweat and tears, cultivating the land that grows the stories of its people, in a cycle of life, death and regeneration. That soil is my sea of water, my beginning, the base of my matter.” “When I lay down, I might realize that I do not need a bed for it. Perhaps, when I let go of my bed I can let go of all. Free from material goods and commodities, from object dependency and the confines of the house. Only then, perhaps, I can go to the soil, where architecture comes from and find my home in it. Akin to a fox who digs its lair along the grassy slopes at the edges or inside the woods or to a bird who in the woods finds the twigs to make the nest on the tree. How beautiful it is to ride the airflows: of imagination, of necessities, to find the way to live along with the essences.” Elia Castino is a Piedmontese artist with Neapolitan heart. Builder, farmer, poet and cinematographer of the cave, he lives in a stilt house on a mud island surrounded by a silver lake. LaaLa LaLaaaa La LaaLaLaaa A Moment And A Song has been realized through the precious collaboration with: Fabian Reichle for the sound piece. Martine van Ditzhuyzen for the performance. Sergi Casero Nieto for the graphic design. Giovanni Salice for the photography. Samuel Fuentes for the cinematography. Reneenee - Kim Wawer and Kristoffer Zeiner - for the main venue. Paul and Gloria van der Wal for the performance venue. A special thank you goes to Gemma Garberoglio, Angelo Castino, Anna Chiabrera, Liza Strakhova, Tom Delboo, Rūta Junevičiūtė, Tamir Eting, Francesca Lucchitta, Marieke van den Bosch, Carolina Papetti, Ingeborg Meier Andersen. This project is supported by the AFK (Amsterdam Fund for the Arts).