Paula Lovely

Visibility is my superpower: no campaign will ever take the stigma off our shoulders if we keep having our lives told by others

Paolo Gorgoni (aka Paula Lovely) studied at Istituto Superiore di Studi Musicals O.Vecchi-A.Tonelli (Modena) and graduated from the Step Up Training Academy - Skills Training to Empower Patients program by the European AIDS Treatment Group, EATG (2015). Since 2012 they've been on the board of directors of Plus APS, an Italian network of LGBT people living with HIV, they're co-founder of BLQ Checkpoint (community center for HIV screening and peer counseling on sexual health), a member of GAT Portugal (Treatment Activists Group), Community Representative and member of the Deliberative Commission for Fast Track Cities Lisbon - Lisboa sem SIDA. (https://www.lisboa.pt/en/lisboasemsida). This latest initiative is part of a worldwide network of cities committed to strengthening the local response to the HIV epidemic to eliminate new HIV infections by 2030, according to the challenge launched by UNAIDS (http: //www.fast-trackcities .org /). They incorporate performance art, activism, political involvement and community empowerment in the project “Dragtivism for Transformation”, writing, composing, singing, acting and developing works under the name of Paula Lovely.

Their latest works (+ Gl0ry +; B1oom; Messias; Musa, #HIVisible-2gether) comprise a cycle of performance actions dedicated to the visibility and of HIV+ experiences whose reading takes place through the prism of religious formulas and symbols, in search of a resilient, empowered and permanent flourishing called "a proudly poz porn-revolution"(2018-2021). The key to their artistic research is to rewrite the narrative around HIV, providing a contemporary view retold by people living with HIV and working on all possible and necessary intersections between art, activism and the drag universe. They participate as a performer at the Gender Bender Festival in 2013, in the production “La variante de Luneburg” at Teatro Manzoni and collaborate with “Teatri di Vita” in 2014 (Bologna, Italy). In 2016 the character of Gaby debuts in the show “ToZé, amigo” in a performance that defies gender standards on the occasion of the World Theater Day celebrated with Lua Cheia Teatro, in Lisbon. In 2017 they create the Show “transformacções” as Paula Lovely, Perform with João Caçador (Fado Bicha) both on the stage of the March of Pride and in Favela Lx, queer resistance underground space and create their own Karaoke / Show format “Sing it out ”, where they collaborate with choreographer Lara Russo and Artivist Luca Modesti. They Perform on Gender Detonation, by the collective Rabbit Hole, at Galeria Zé dos bois in Lisbon; then collaborate with The first edition of the Lisbon Feminist Festival, where they present the musical performance work “Cocktail d'Amore” in partnership withPássaroMacaco and, at the end of the same year, present “Fuck me I'm POZ” at the festival ¿ Anormales? in Lisbon. In 2018 they performs at Pride in Milan, where they also collaborate with VICE Italia in an episode of the online series “La prima volta” by Irene Graziosi. Next, they create the poz&proud show format “conigli bianchi show”, with the collective “conigli bianchi - artivists contro la sierofobia” that debuts in July 2018 at the International AIDS Society Conference in Amsterdam.
They collaborate briefly with the pianist Francesca Guatteri and the visual artist Asia Giannelli in HIV/AIDS awareness events both in Portugal (Teatro São Luiz, Lisbon) and in Italy (Teatro Testoni, Bologna). Between 2018 and 2020 they collaborate with Anjos70, in Lisbon, where they present performance works at Mercado Maroto (+ Gl0ry +) and Unconvention (B1oom). She is Grand Marshal of the 20th edition of the March of LGBTQI+ Pride of Lisbon, in 2019. In 2020 they collaborate with DramaMilano in the Vocal Drama night (Ostello Bello, Milan), and take the Conigli Bianchi Show to historic Macao, still in Milan, in February. Re-perform the performance + Gl0ry + in the vernissage Visões Indecisionistas, in the InBloom space, in Lisbon, write and produce “Pandemic: a six-handed study” with the photographer Fidelia Avanzato and the writer and researcher Gaia Giuliani. In July, they produce Messias (after all I was not the Messiah), site-specific and “relation-specific” performance taking place in the intimate and unfathomable space of a domestic environment. In December 2020 Paula Lovely and Teresa Fabião join forces into creating the collective VIRAL and produce with Luca Modesti and other partners and allies the action #HIVisible-2gether, that takes places simultaneously in 4 cities around the world. In the same month, the 30-minute musical solo performance "MUSA" is presented at Finalmente Club (Lisboa).