To Maria
Unknown Woman is both a realistic and an imaginary tale, a gathering of memories and thoughts about what has happened to an important artist in 20 years of sharing and collaborating. She and I, during the last 20 years, have been used to telling each other secrets through movement, healthy carriers of truth, an untidy diary where I have had to read and reread notes in order to understand the woman and the artist. Maybe we have understood each other only in rehearsal rooms or on stage in a theatre, but how is one able to understand an artist? To follow her has been possible only with eyes and heart, any other way confuses one even more and each time you almost have to start over again, as though we introduced ourselves and asked each other’s name for the first time. I don’t know where imagination ends and how much I have learned about her in these 20 years. As strangers we are still in rehearsal rooms, we observe each other, we give and take from each other, however we know each other well and for this reason we are still walking side by side.
(Mauro Astolfi)
