Francesca Grilli

For over a year, Francesca Grilli gathered testimonies from individuals living as hikikomori in Japan—recluses who retreat from social life into total domestic isolation while paradoxically streaming their loneliness and daily routines for the world to see. In Record: Graz, these intimate confessions and digital traces of withdrawal form the score for a choral piece performed by young people from Graz.

For Grilli, the performance hinges on the tension between seclusion and exposure—a contradiction defining a generation that retires from physical society while remaining hypervisible online and under constant pressure to perform. The piece is staged at a local student hostel, with the cast perched along the facade and balconies. Positioned between the rooms and the street below, they translate private retreat into an ambiguous public presence.

Francesca Grilli (1978, Bologna, Italy) is an artist who works with performance, video, and installation. In her projects, she explores the limits of the body and the language of movement, often addressing the intersection between physical presence and visual narrative. Her works have been exhibited at numerous institutions, including Nasjonalmuseet, Oslo; Mladi Levi, Ljubljana; the 12th Kaunas Biennial; Santarcangelo Festival; Palais de Tokyo, Paris; the 55th Venice Biennale; MACRO, Rome; Serpentine Galleries, London; and Manifesta 7, Bolzano. Grilli lives in Bologna and Brussels.