“Preparing this art project and its realization was special and complex, as is the occasion for which it was born. The idea came suddenly as a visual apparition at the beginning of my pregnancy. It was the challenge that I could not fail to do, because it was an act of love for Sole and for the world.
I started working on it several months earlier, focusing on the design of the sculpture-dress I had in mind for the performance piece: sketches, drafts, studies. Then I started searching for a pattern maker-seamstress, happily found in Valentina Donadel.
We started countless creative producing and testing sessions, on basting fabric, where we modeled together, as a work in progress, every inch of shapes and volumes of the dress, adapting it to my project and to my body. It has been wonderful working with Valentina, both precise, and creative, super meticulous and super elastic … It was a great fun and a great effort, because we have remodeled everything several times, arriving, as always, at the end of the deadline at the very last moment, finishing everything out of breath … adding to it that I had my big belly and not only got tired more easily, but I had to take care of everything I had to do for the well-being of Sole and of the pregnancy… it was a task very challenging, but we did it!
I painted the written letters on the dress completely by hand and with specific fabric colours just the day before leaving for Venice. The dress was not ready earlier because we retouched many details, even if I had foreseen that I would have needed three whole days of work for composing and painting all the letters … Oh my God, how can I make it in one day? – I said to myself – I am pregnant and I do not have an infinite physical strength and resistance! But nevertheless I spent the whole day and part of the night squatted down in the frog position, with the big belly between the knees, half lying on the floor of my studio where I had spread the dress, designing and painting the letters with precision, without staining the fabric, with the help of self hand made acetate masks, tissue and paper tape … It has been an enormous effort, but also very fun.
Yes, I managed to finish everything that night but the result was that the next day, when I had to leave for Venice, I was tired as never before and couldn’t get out of the bed! I moved the train in the late afternoon but I made an immense effort anyway for getting up and preparing the last things, and for taking the train alone with my big belly and my suitcase. I tried to bring the minimum of luggage possible but I needed everything necessary for the performance, from the spare camera to the very heavy sculpture-dress and the cape to wear on it. (…)” (LIUBA)