ORDERLINESS

The silent video Orderliness links the story of a small town to a social and historical culture that has always characterized the Netherlands: in the 19th century, the entire village of Veenhuizen is transformed into a penal colony. Mangano analyzes this place starting from the typical houses of this small town of North Holland. The inscriptions that appear on more than twenty houses are the slogans that show their distance from our time. One aspect of moral austerity, always summarized in two or three words, which more than rise to the doctrine seems to survey the inhabitants of the village, which was used as a colony of re-education for marginalized people. The houses with the writings evoke a presence. They become the faces that pronounce those slogans, through their serious and austere architecture that does not allow for any entertainment but remains concentrated in its geometry, its functionality, its educational role and not open to distraction. Between the two windows there are words that admit no uncertainties. Block letters, with a clear and direct character, make the building into a monument stripping it of its neutral functionality as a dwelling. The houses speak, control and monitor through the apparent serenity of the village.