Theatre and Art Converge Inside Milan's Opera Prison

At the Opera prison in Milan, inmates and former inmates wrote and performed the play 'Extravagare' under director Ivana Trettel. The stage featured a large bull symbolizing early civilizations and an immense contemporary artwork, 'Grande oggetto pneumatico' (1959), by Gruppo T. The collective, comprising Giovanni Anceschi, Davide Boriani, Gianni Colombo, Gabriele De Vecchi, and Grazia Varisco, pioneered kinetic and metamorphic art. Their installation consists of six large transparent polyethylene tubes that inflate and deflate, invading the space and forcing actors to navigate among them. The work explores perception of space and time, a core theme of the play. Gruppo T's manifesto, presented in 1960 at Galleria Pater in Milan with this piece, states: 'We consider reality as a continuous becoming of phenomena that we perceive in variation.' The work later traveled to Rome, New York, and Centre Pompidou Metz. Since 2009, the company Opera Liquida has worked inside Opera prison, creating performances from inmates' texts with costumes and sets made in collaboration with academy and university students. 'Extravagare' contrasts values of art, femininity, and theatre against violence, machismo, and societal injustices, structured like an ancient Greek tragedy with parodos, episodes, stasima, and exodus.