“The law is a promise that only keeps itself in the form of a threat.” (Anne Boyer)

Based on a fictional legal system and its foundational penal code, Corpus Iuris Artis unfolds as an exhibition and performance cycle, in which Selin Davasse questions, codifies, institutionalizes and puts on trial the art world’s representational claims and ethical posturing. This Corpus – a body of work, revolving around a body of law, enacted by a body in space – promises a spectacle of justice and threatens to expose hypocrisies and contradictions. In a playful attempt at imagining legal norms, instruments and procedures, Davasse speculates on how these tools and processes would be implemented in common art world scenarios. As performer and representative, the artist adopts the roles of the various parties involved: she prosecutes and is prosecuted; testifies and is testified about; judges and is judged. 

Selin Davasse’s exhibition Corpus Iuris Artis: II. The Hearing führt uns an den fiktiven „Gerichtshof für ethische Abrechnung in der Kunst“ – eine provisorisch errichtete Theaterbühne für eine Anhörung, Kulisse für ein Spektakel. In Anspielung auf den zutiefst performativen Charakter des Rechts und die Fragilität von Rechtssystemen spielt sich dieses Gerichtsdrama in einem Kartenhaus ab, das jeden Moment in sich zusammenfallen könnte. Anhand von Gerichtsvideos und -protokollen werden Delikte wie  „Betrügerisches und verwerfliches Opferverhalten“, „Vorsätzliche Verschleierung von Klassenprivilegien im Rahmen von Opferverhalten“ oder „Verschwörung zum performativen Allyship“ verhandelt. Hinter den Kulissen erleben wir in einem intimen und doch distanzierten Videoporträt die inneren Monologe, prägenden Erinnerungen, widersprüchlichen Glaubenssysteme, Prüfungen und Leiden einer Staatsanwältin. Beauftragt mit der Einhaltung des „Codex Iuris Artis – Statuten für spekulative und situative Ethik in der Kunstwelt”, besteht ihre Aufgabe nicht nur darin, ethische Doktrinen und berufliche Richtlinien durchzusetzen, sondern diese in all ihren Widersprüchen zu verkörpern. Zugleich Autoritätsfigur, Sündenbock und Opferlamm, wird die Staatsanwältin zum Symbol für die disziplinären Fantasien und Misserfolge der Kunstwelt. Sie ist eine Frau, die Regeln in eine Leere spricht, die nicht zuhört.

Conceived as a three-act project, the consecutive steps of this imagined legal process are played out: While evidence about alleged offenses was gathered in Corpus Iuris Artis I: The Deposition (curated by soft power at Mouches Volantes, Cologne, 28.6.–9.8.2025) and a trial is staged in Corpus Iuris Artis: II. The Hearing – the first time performance artist Davasse presents her work in the framework of a solo exhibition, featuring new video works commissioned by soft power – the final performance Corpus Iuris Artis: III. The Appeal takes place in a courtroom of a Berlin district court (commissioned by Pickle Bar at Amtsgericht Mitte, 13.9.2025) where the procedural fairness of past trials is argued: The final opportunity for the defendants to challenge the verdict; the only thing standing between them and their residency sentence to be served at “The Reflective Institution for Art Professionals” – colloquially known as ArtJail. 

The law is a fragile performance, it relies on speech acts: swearing to tell the truth, telling a self-serving version of the truth, making up the truth along the way, surviving the holes being poked in our truth, trying to get to the truth at whatever cost. Corpus Iuris Artis likewise relies on speech acts, both truthful and false; delivered in diverse spaces, both legal and artistic; presented in various forms, both live and recorded. Approaching the mechanisms and power dynamics within the art world in a satirical tone, Corpus Iuris Artis addresses issues of accountability, complicity, and truthfulness. The word verdict comes from Latin verdictus: “to speak the truth.” Art professionals, through their work and self-fashioning, traffic in narratives. But what compels us to tell the truth? What consequences do we suffer for withholding or distorting it? We present ourselves as moral agents – but how well would our stories hold up if we were really judged as such? 

A reflection on the founding and functioning of institutions, Jacques Derrida’s Declarations of Independence (1976) begins with the sentence “It is better that you know right away: I am not going to keep my promise.” Likewise, the promises made here might not be kept. The performer/representative offers herself up as merely the draftsman or secretary responsible for the task of drawing up and putting in writing what the art world knew it wanted to say. Do we create the law or does the law create us? The final verdict(us) is left to the audience.

Credits
Selin Davasse
Dura Lex, Sed Lex (The Law Is Harsh, But It Is The Law), 2025
Video, color, sound; 20 min. 
Art Direction: Daniel Hopp
Kamera & Schnitt: Kurt Heuvens
Hair & Make-up: Theo Schnürer

Selin Davasse
Res Ipsa Loquitor (The Thing Speaks for Itself), 2025
Video, color; duration tbc
Videography: Daniel Hopp
Set Design: Sonny Neigut & Jonas Maria Droste
Look: Haderlump
Hair & Make-up: Janette Peters

As part of Berlin Art Week Featured 2025 in cooperation with
Corpus Iuris Artis: III. The Appeal
Commissioned by Pickle Bar 
Performances am 13.9.2025, 19.00 & 20.00 
at Amtsgericht Mitte (Littenstraße 12–17, 10179 Berlin)
Registration via: www.picklebar.berlin