CHAOS is an expositive project of photo essays, with it  I seek to show to the world entities with different forms of existence, promoting a fuller life on Planet Earth (pluriversity).

CHAOS is an expositive project—the product of exploratory artistic research—that seeks to showcase different ways of experiencing life on planet Earth (existential pluriversities). I am developing this project throughout my daily life, creating artworks in the form of photographic portraits and written narratives about the entities I encounter and connect with. I refer to “entities” because I broaden the possibility of establishing connections with human and non-human existences, such as animals, insects, plants, minerals, natural phenomena, toys, manufactured goods, communities, and so on. Each one has its own “personal narrative” (PN), a present way of experiencing its existence (its way of living life), which I seek to understand and share with the world. Each PN is unique and, at the same time, in its convergence with other PNs, forms the “common narrative” (CN). The CN is what a group of entities (society, pack, country, institution, community, etc.) recounts about how they experience life. With Project CHAOS I seek to show how the differences of entities converge in a specific CN (the community, territory where I am currently living).

I began this project in 2019 in Argentine Patagonia, and it is currently expanding its reach to the United States, where I was born and currently reside, and expanding into Italy and Spain, where my family originated. The portraits and narratives are “experimental documentary”. Its initial exhibition format is on my website, www.mariangelamussatti.com. I am also presenting each stage (territories explored) in physical exhibitions. The goal of sharing this artistic material is to offer viewers the opportunity to discover not only other existences but also other narratives of how life is lived and how it can be lived on planet Earth. This encourages them to broaden their own perspective, opening themselves up in their daily lives to establish new bonds of kinship (with entities they may not have previously perceived).

I use the concept of chaos to highlight that this convergence of perspectives in reality is not static but rather a constant process of becoming. I problematize discursive quietism and the standardization of CN (those normative discourses controlled by sectors of power), which instead of being nourished by the experiential differences of PN , proclaim fixed existential models about what it is to live, coercing and limiting entities.

With Project CHAOS, my objective is to show the world entities in their difference and originality (their noise/chaos within the normative standardization of life), valuing them in their public image, focusing on those who are still unseen or have little global visibility. This fosters openness and a rethinking of PN and CN of the portrayed entities and communities (who gain insight upon seeing and hearing themselves in their portraits and stories), in the viewers (who question and expand their narratives when they see someone different), and in myself. This contributes to a subjective-communitary-ecological-spiritual impact (SCES) for more fulfilling lives on planet Earth.