From 1736 to 1784 lived one of the most controversial figures in the Christian religion. She preached that Christ was reincarnated in a woman, and that woman was her. And that, somehow, has something to do with design as well.

At the 82nd Venice Film Festival, a musical inspired by her is competing for the Golden Lion: The Testament of Ann Lee was directed by Mona Fastvold and co-written by Brady Corbet, with whom the director worked on The Brutalist, the film that earned three statuettes at the Osca last March

The followers of "Mother Ann," (they called her that, or also "Mother in spiritual things" or "Ann the Word") took the name of Shaker because atonement for sin took place through energetic dances and chants that were consumed in large rooms bordered by their famous wooden hangers. Renunciation of carnal experiences was unquestionable. Ann Lee categorically rejected any physical relationship.

In 1774 Mother Ann left Manchester, her hometown, where she had been arrested several times for those dances considered disrespectful and for what she was preaching. She settled in Watervliet (now Nikasayuna), near Albany, the capital of New York state, with seven of her followers. It is here that the story of the community also becomes a story of design. We are at the dawn of the second industrial revolution. Following the principles of honesty, utility, simplicity, the Shakers make furniture to inhabit pure and essential spaces. But they also sell them. The community that aspired to "establish the kingdom of God on earth" lived among those dances, with the earnings from their self-made furniture, without gender and respecting total and real gender equality.

In addition to Amanda Seyfried, who plays Ann Lee, the cast of the musical to be presented at the festival this August includes Thomasin McKenzie, Lewis Pullman, Christopher Abbott, Tim Blake Nelson, Stacy Martin, and Matthew Beard. The film, like The Brutalist, was shot on 70 mm film; meanwhile, at the Vitra Deisgn Museum, the exhibition "The Shakers: A World in the Making," mounted by Formafantasma, is still running. At a time when humanity faces increasingly complex issues, will the simplicity of the shakers be able to show us a way out?