C0N10UR and 𝚊𝚛𝚐𝚘𝚜 present Small Acts of Violence. You’re invited to walk through a low landscape of broken ceramics vases, moldy collages and brick walls. Wait in the seating area for a caring guide to welcome you into a fabric cocoon, and experience the artist Aay Liparoto’s immersive cinematic virtual reality work at the heart of this exhibition.

Do you consent to participate in this loving experience? Do you choose to stay or will you leave? In this exhibition, you cannot just watch passively. You choose the family situations you gaze on, or turn away from. Small Acts of Violence makes you physically feel how the boundaries constantly shift between safe and unsafe, between love and violence. It’s surreal, recognizable, and elusive at the same time. You enter a loving, volatile universe. Stories of intimate violence are not shunned; instead motivations are explored and unpacked. You’re invited to reflect on your own behaviors and assert your own boundaries. On your path in this sensuous, enticing world, you’re surrounded by soft fabrics and sharp edges.

Afterwards, you’ll be cared for by the guide, as you’re invited to reflect on your experience in the seating area. Listen to the story your body is telling you.

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What actions do you perform in the name of love? What bad behaviors do you blame on love? Small Acts of Violence makes you aware of the relationship between love and nonconsensual violence. As your body is immersed in a beautiful, sexual, tender, and grotesque environment, you hear overlapping and melting testimonies and observe domestic scenes. A central figure devotedly guides you through a soft bubble of familiar objects, kitschy and colorful.

The stories are based on true personal experiences of women, nonbinary and non-cis male perpetrators of domestic violence and self harm and have been collected in Belgium and the United Kingdom. The testimonies, fused with the intimate performances of a fictional family, challenge assumptions about domestic violence. Who is a victim? Who is perpetrator?

With this exhibition, Brussels-based artist Aay Liparoto (1987, New Jersey, USA) reminds you of your autonomy. As often in their work, they explore the (social and institutional) boundaries that define our intimate relationships and the power relations that intervene on our daily lives and bodies. ​​Small Acts of Violence wants you to reflect on how you love. It is an invitation to collectively pursue a love free of violence.

Curators: Auguste Orts

Small Acts of Violence is proudly produced by argos centre for audiovisual arts, co-produced by CON10UR, V2_ Lab for the Unstable Media (NL) and supported by Flanders Audiovisual Fund (VAF), the Flemish Government and VGC. Thanks to Morpho VZW, Workspacebrussels, Kunstenwerkplaats en Academie Beeldende & Audiovisuele Kunsten Anderlecht.

C0N10UR is presented and produced by kunstencentrum nona in collaboration with 𝚊𝚛𝚐𝚘𝚜, Cinema Lumière Mechelen, De Garage, Kunsthal Extra City, Museum Hof van Busleyden and Visit Mechelen. With the support of: the French Embassy in Belgium and Institut Français, as part of EXTRA, a programme supporting French contemporary creation; the Embassy of the Kingdom of the Netherlands in Belgium. Kunstencentrum nona thanks the players of the National Lottery and the National Lottery for their support of C0N10UR. argos thanks Molengeek for the VR headsets.

A very special thanks to all those who shared their stories and lives through interviews.