"do it to Julia" (2019), Nikos Papadopoulos

The sculptural research-installation "Do it to Julia" takes as its starting point the penultimate scene from the book, Nineteen Eighty-Four, by George Orwell (1949).

There the hero, Winston Smith, tortured in the Ministry of Love, literally comes face to face with his worst fear: the rat.

The manner of this encounter is so profound that Smith begs the jailers not to torture him but his beloved, Julia.

The scene marks the moment of defeat. Smith from this point, no longer exists as an agent of resistance, but only as a disciplined, empty body.

The work is created by a complex of adverse fears / phobias that threaten the other coherence of the identity.

The disgusting reptiles and bugs, the occupation of the ego by "alien" bodies that deconstruct from the inside, the boundaries of the self that overflow uncontrollably, the sexual anxiety about reproductive capacity and paternity -VR with dancing child figures -, the performance of national masculinity -VR with national heroes-, the sounds of rustling and lullabies, the cables running to the pc -information center-, all together make up a digital bad dream.