Monica

Ultraviolet Stroke is the fourth episode of Monica, a speculative telenovela by Pablo Lilienfeld and Federico Vladimir.

Monica is the name of both artists' mothers. This coincidence has fascinated them since they began their relationship. Both Monica's were born in Argentina in the 1950s as daughters of European war refugees, and they both emigrated to Spain as adults. Monica Lilienfeld (Pablo’s mum) was a painter who died very young, in 1986. Monica Pezdirc (Fede’s mum) posed nude throughout her life in the erotic photographs taken by her husband. The ecofeminist paintings by Mónica Lilienfeld and the photographs by Mónica Pezdirc are the starting point of this speculative telenovela.

With Monica the artists are using role-playing games as performative tools to explore diasporic genealogies that are more focused on becoming than being. Non-heteronormative horizontal relations become as important as patrilineal verticality; the trees of reproductive genealogy intermingling in a tentacular genealogy of worldling images.