São Paulo, 1987

Mutant identities, the fragmented “I” and loosened roles in the workplace are subjects that have become increasingly present in our everyday lives. These still disputed concepts tend to align with the biopower through which the current phase of capitalism chips away at our rights and worms into our digital lives, or “second life”, in order to generate more capital. On the other hand, certain distortions point toward experiments and accruals that create situations that would have been unimaginable before. At the start of the 2000s, the artist Ricardo Basbaum invested in the “etc.” concept as a way of elasticizing the conventional categories of work in the visual arts system: “When the artist questions the nature and function of his/her role, we should write ‘etc.-artist’ (so we can imagine several categories: curator-artist, writer-artist, activist-artist etc.)”.

Etc.-artist (etc.-curator, etc.-singer, etc.-clubber) Bruno Mendonça positions himself as an agent who operates inside and outside this system. Through zines, exhibitions or mic-sessions, he creates environments and platforms—often temporary—in order to discuss and problematize not only the artistic metier, but also sexuality, gender, or any other fixed cultural or urban category. The internet is another medium he works through, and this was the environment on which he developed his work-fronts for Frestas, involving posts, spoken-word exercises, collages, and after-party testimonials that, after circulating for a while on the social media, were transformed into an online publication to be launched with a mic-stand performance at Sesc Sorocaba.

[J.A.]