Conference Participants’ Abstracts
Wednesday 17 April
11.30 – 12.10 Οpening Speech
11.30 – 12.00 Μanos Stefanidis, “Performance: Theory and Practice. The Greek Case”
In performance, the limits of the physical and the theatrical are tested, and the body becomes both testimony and torment. In 2017, in one of my postgraduate courses on performance at the Department of Theatre Studies, Angelos Papadimitriou realised an improvised performance, while another time, in the presence of Angelos Skourtis, the painter, director and performer Angelos Spartalis performed an improvised action, enticing even the students to participate. Its subject was the last hours of his deceased father. Recently, the actor Michalis Sarantis and the painter Apostolos Chantzaras have performed onstage Sophocles’ Ajax. The former plays all the roles and the latter supplies the protagonist with the faces of the heroes which he creates as the actor plays on the stage. When the performance ends, an entire painting exhibition has been created out of nothing. What is theatre, what is performance, what are their differences, what are their convergences? How much do we know about the important Greek performers throughout time and how much about their history? From Maria Karavela to Leda Papakonstantinou and from Grigoris Semitecolo and Yiannis Christou to Caniaris and Stathis Logothetis?
First Session
12.20 – 13.45 Expanded Scenography, Performance and Public Space: Critical Frameworks
12.20 – 12.35 Giorgos Pefanis, “Some Thoughts on the Dualism of Performance”
Performance, yield, efficiency and all the conceptual nuances of normative performance, elaborated by thinkers such as Marcuse, Lyotard or Butler, are intertwined and interwοven with the more subtle, symbolic or artistic, conceptual nuances of the singular performance offered by the differential and exceptional performance of the performing arts. These nuances are not intertwined a second time but are already interwoven in a generative root that connects and unifies them from the beginning creating the dualism of performance. In this congruence, it is impossible to separate the performing act of an exceptional performance from the process of producing products, meanings and services. On the contrary, the characteristics of this process are also channelled into cultural and artistic performances. Thus, the overaccumulation of capital, the successive waves of concentration of space and time in production, exchange and consumption, and the shrinking of the time of circulation with the corresponding development of techniques and technologies of credit, distribution, circulation, information and influence have had a decisive impact on the entertainment market, accelerating its already rapid growth in recent decades.
12.35 – 12.50 Irene Gerogianni, “Performing Democracy, Distributing Power: The Revival of the Spirit of The Bacchae through Performance Art”
Unlike other Greek tragedies, Euripides’ The Bacchae was scarcely produced before 1968. By the end of the 1960s, however, there was an impressive record of performances that “would justify labelling the years between 1968 and 1978 the decade of The Bacchae” (Fischer-Lichte 2005). The return of Dionysus on the theatrical stage has often been interpreted as a response to the specific sociocultural developments of the 1960s and 1970s, with The Bacchae’s plot producing analogies to an environment of political and social excess, characterised by both the fragmentation of the individual in society and the reconstruction of new forms of community. Conversely, it becomes clear that the concurrent emergence of performance art as a new medium goes hand in hand with the politically and institutionally targeted mandates of the time. Artists such as Marina Abramovic, Yoko Ono, Gina Pane, and Leda Papaconstantinou turned ‘sparagmos’ and ‘omophagia’ into their bodies to reflect on the idea of democracy in the contemporary context, in the various forms that the political is embodied and an embodied public sphere is realised. As they navigate the issue of inclusion and exclusion, social participation and the “part of those that have no part” (Rancière [1998] 2012) in contemporary societies, the above-mentioned performance artists give agency (back) to the audience, while producing communities and redistributing power. This paper aims to place performance art at the centre of the debate on the distribution of – artistic and political – power and to recognize the visual arts as the context that provided the necessary space for the foundational episode of democracy, the assassination of the King, “when the symbolic collapses to produce a disembodied social presence” (Rancière [1998] 2012).
12.50 – 13.05 Μaria Κοnomi, “Blurring the Boundaries of Life and Art: Visual and Performative Elements in Demonstrations and Activist Protest Events in Public Space”
The central focus of this paper presentation is the expanded artistic and performative practices in situations of mass protest mobilizations and various manifestations of socio-political activism. The right to socio-political protest in public space is a fundamental democratic citizen right. The political effect of visual and performative elements in protests and activist events is a highly interesting research topic bringing to our attention the essential interconnections of creative performative approaches with complex real-life conditions and socio-political contexts. Expanded visual, performative and costuming practices have always been present as forms of political practice but have proliferated in the last decade as protest movements have increasingly adopted these tactics as tools for expressing embodied dissent, creating a rich reservoir of diverse forms, meanings and experiences of performativity. Visual and performative elements in street demonstrations and activist protests contribute significantly to the visual impact, emotional resonance and communicative power of these events, expressing various political meanings and bringing about awareness of critical issues with the aim of socio-political change. The exploration of visual and performative elements, which are positioned beyond the established visual, scenographic and costume elements related to the performing arts, leads us as concept, methodology and practice to extensions of contemporary expanded scenography (and even beyond scenography), as well as to the broader “performative turn” in the humanities and social sciences. In the above context, we will discuss the visual and performative dimension of some examples of activist protest actions with diverse ecological, political, and gendered aspects from Greece and the international arena.
13.05 – 13.20 Steriani Τsintziloni, “Performance Shop: performance as immaterial service and the everyday”
The paper presentation will examine the project Performance Shop by the Cypriot choreographer Lia Haraki, presented at the Athens Festival in 2018 as part of the “Opening to City” section. It was a pop-up shop, operated at the commercial centre of Athens for one month, and hosted performances by artists from the dance and performance scene. The concept of Performance Shop is based on the experience of performance as a gift or service provided for oneself or offered to others. The Performance Shop included works on display at the windows of the shop, participatory events and performances for a limited number of spectators (often one-to-one). This kind of form creates conditions of familiarity and intimacy between performers and audience members, which come in contrast with the noisy and tensed environment of the city centre. The presentation will explore ways in which Performance Shop negotiates the everyday and ordinary of the concept “shop” with the experience and the extraordinary of the performance. Such practices suggest re-approaching the relationship between artists and the city’s inhabitants and reveal the contradiction between the immaterial experience of the performance and the concept of “commodity” for purchase.
13.20 – 13.35 Panos Κοuros, “Unsettled Proximities in Slow ground”
If places travel, certain sites are slower, they resist the powerful images and identities which are constructed by the accumulation of cultural events, monuments and ruins. I am interested in the possibilities of such speaking sites when the delay in their reproduction in the framework of cultural actions and events is aligned with the organizing of situations of proximity with specific others. I will follow a narrative connecting certain works from my archive, which I have realized in different times and contexts. These works are not introduced as “art documentation” in the art system but acquire economic and symbolic value when they appear in archives that I constitute. Works are performed through small-scale interpersonal encounters in specific sites, which are typically delivered to the public through the generic logic of archaeological management and contemporary art curating. A way of “public intimacy” is attempted, countering the rigid socialities of art exhibitions and archaeological sites with proprietary ways of relating, which incorporate the experience of the weather and weathering. I bring up the notion of body-weather in connection to the feminist figuration of “better weathering”, theorized by Hamilton, Zettel and Neimanis, as a response to the neoliberal resilient strategies of confronting climate change. “Better weathering” is enacted by experimental forms of sociality as a transformative infrastructure which reinforces differences and uneven vulnerabilities among strangers.
Second Session
13.55 – 15.20 Urban Space and Performative Practices
13.55 – 14.10 Lila Leontidou, “Loss and Creative Repossession of Public Space in the Mediterranean City”
There was a sharp antithesis in the use of public space between the 2010s and the 2020s in the Mediterranean. In the 2010s, cities were shaken by popular mobilizations, from the South of the Arab Spring to the North of the debt crisis and the movement of the piazzas. But in the 2020s, the COVID-19 pandemic closed the city and excluded inhabitants from public spaces. Forms of public art were also diversified. After the previous century of rather permanent and often static art, the new millennium established ephemeral and constantly moving art, natural and digital, in the hybrid city: internet appearances and disappearances and wall paintings, installations, music, lights, projections, elements of the “smart city”, performance, whether site-specific or more loosely linked to space. In the cities today, we find (a) free and unattached art aiming at collective joy and culture, (b) art networked with urban events, like mobilizations with music, dance, performance, celebrations of electoral or athletic triumphs, carnival processions for the whole city in Rio, Venice, Patra, Xanthi, London’s Notting Hill, (c) art consciously bound to advertise gentrifying interventions of dominant groups to urban space – especially since art needs funding – as well as parades and pre-election speeches or (d) art commissioned by governmental and other official bodies, which may render public space a field for propaganda with ephemeral events and installations, like the recent one in Athens where the Parliament was lighted with the flag of Israel as the war in Palestine was raging. These two latter forms of art, which use space instrumentally for the advertisement of government and the entrepreneurial city, expand the sense of loss of public space. For its creative repossession, art must liberate itself from power structures and turn towards the two former art forms: emphasis on collective joy, celebrations, and sometimes riddance from restrictions and oppression.
14.10 – 14.25 Κostas Daflos, “The Art Program Cipo_nomadic actions”
This paper presentation addresses the experience of the Cipo_ project, parasitic nomadic acts and art installations, which, since 2003, took the forms of: (a) stage performances by technologies and tactics, which allowed performers and spectators to participate in performative events (expanded scenographies), and (b) public acts in the city (for the emergence of local public spheres) with nomadic trolleys (portable standardized mobile trailers). Technically, these nomadic installations were made possible as recycled technological toolbox devices from practices of reusing micromaterials, software and hardware (lego robotics). They followed the expanded theory of transdisciplinary redefinition of thinking and practices in art, in the condition of a new problematization of the concepts of space and subject (nomadic performative turn). In particular, the trajectory of these searches around the tactics, methods, practices, theory, means of production, as well as modes of alternative sharing, is located in the condition of a broader redefinition of thinking and practices in the arts. They refer to the “embodied turn” and the “performative turn” in collective public art practices in the public sphere, according to critical orientations (self-institution), with the notion of place and site also expanding (“spatial turn”, “nomadic turn”), including additional directions of performative documentation (“archival turn”). Other expansions: theory of space: the field-landscape relationship is extended to cultural content as a network of places (place: meaningful space of common resources and goods) and mobile site; nomadic theory: expands the phenomenological site-specific installation into site-generic social content, further expanding the subject; performative theory: expands text-drama-based theatrical hypocritical interpretation into (meaningful) act, further expanding the subject; relational and dialogical theory: critique of territorial relation – of collective practices –, of technological otherness; sculpture in the expanded field, queer phenomenology.
14.25 – 14.40 Ιoanna Remediaki, “Ιera Odos 2: In Search of the Body of the City”
Iera Odos 2 is a performance-guided tour performed by the theatre group Ison Ena on the streets of Athens, Rome and Ierapetra, in six different versions, during 2011-12. It poses the question: what does the city have to say to us and what do we have to say to the city? It seeks the collective public body, the body of the city, and the common voice, bringing in its baggage stories of people, places, and a common need. The announcement recalls the performance’s course so far and adds to it its current action, which will take place in the context of the conference, renewing the question and the search for the political and the city.
14.40 – 14.55 Εfrossyni Τsakiri – Georgia Τouliatou “The Embodied Experience of Water in the Thermal Baths of Greece”
Water is a basic element of our world at a rate of 70% of matter. As a public good, access to it is a universal human right and a key element of public space, the urban and natural environment. Our experience with water has multisensory aspects. The first life forms develop in water, the foetus grows in water, and the human body consists of 70% water. It offers purification, well-being, and life, it is included in myths, and beliefs, contributing in various ways to the formation and development of human culture, sciences and arts. Italo Calvino refers in Invisible Cities to water as a generative element of the city, Gaston Bachelard in The Poetics of Space includes a Henri Bosco description of the existential, atmospheric and magical nature of water: “right in front of my feet the water came out from Erebus...”. Guy de Maupassant in the short story Night: A Nightmare likens water with the fear of death. The significant relationship between man and thermal, therapeutic water was explored by students who participated in courses and workshops that investigated physical contact with water through “thermalism” in places with physical spa resources. The students mapped aspects of their multi-sensory experience that mainly took place in public outdoor spaces and then presented their work through digital narration (video) and collage. Selected projects will be analysed in the presentation. The work is part of the research project “LOUTROTOPOS: Critical mapping and visual narration of thermal springs in the Hellenic Territory”, funded by the HFRI under the call “Funding of Basic Research (Horizontal Support of all Sciences), National Recovery and Resilience Plan (Greece 2.0)” in the field (S.F.7) “Humanities and Arts”, hosted by UNIWA and coordinated by G. Touliatou, E. Tsakiri and E. Mouzakitou.
14.55 – 15.10 Eleni Linaki, “Topography of Death or Let us not Forget. Renegotiating Social Events in Late Times Through Theatre”
This paper presentation aims to discuss the concept of social-spatial dialectics and its impact on the analysis of spatial dynamics, social reproduction, and transformation. It emphasizes the role of space in understanding “social dynamics, particularly in sociological and anthropological approaches to urban areas”. Lefebvre’s concept of space being constructed through a meaning-making process leads to the fragmentation of space into smaller areas that shape identities over time through actions, structures, and people within urban spaces. Furthermore, the text delves into how a performative art piece, Topography of Death or Let’s Not Forget, introduces the notion of space through a mapping of the city, focusing on areas of homicides in Athens. This artistic endeavour aims to re-appropriate space at a later time, creating a new ritualistic process of initiation and storytelling that redefines points with a new purpose, highlighting visible (signs, monuments) and invisible (murders) threads to reshape social and political bodies within the city. This discussion aligns with the scholarly works on social reproduction, spatial theory, and urban sociology, emphasizing the interconnectedness of space, social practices, and identity formation within urban environments. It underscores the significance of space in shaping individual and collective identities, as well as the potential of artistic representations to redefine spatial narratives and societal structures.
Third Session
15.45 – 17.00 Expanded Scenography and Public Space
15.45 – 16.00 Μarina Κotzamani, “Expanded Scenography and Cultural Memory: Performing Lysis at the Αmphiareion of Oropos (2022)”
An artist focusing on performance and site-specific works for public space, Mary Zygouri, has been exhibiting her work in Greece and Italy, at prestigious international events and foundations. My study focuses on the artist’s performance of Lysis, presented at the archaeological space of Amphiareion of Oropos on 18 September 2022. One of the lesser-known archaeological sites in Greece today, the sanctuary of Oropos, was renowned in antiquity as a sacred space of healing and as an oracle, divining the future through dreams. Zygouri has employed the entire space of the site, the surviving monuments as well as the unique natural environment, to develop a peripatetic performance about the irrational, transformation and transcendence, encouraging alternative approaches to the dominant narrative of national identity, privileging antiquity. Zygouri’s basic tool in the exploration of transformation is the personas, that is, assemblages of readymade and soft materials displaying remarkable agency and performative potential. Approaching the personas as marionettes or objects which the performers bear on their bodies, I explore how Lysis builds an expanded dramaturgy, where space, as its central axis, functions as a carrier of multi-sensory experiences and cultural memory. Subverting logocentric conceptions, space, body and text interact on an equal basis in this dramaturgy, refocusing interpretation from the work and its meaning to the audience and reception. This alternative approach proposes new means of negotiating cultural heritage, in an inclusive conception where the ancient and modern, knowledge and experience, man and the environment, the monuments and nature form a unified ecosystem, broadly participatory and extremely flexible from an interpretative viewpoint. In my research, I make use of methodological tools of expanded scenography as developed by McKinney and S. Palmer (2017) and especially more recently by Rachel Hann (2019). I also draw on material from interviews, which I conducted with participants at Lysis.
16.00 – 16.15 Αdonis Volanakis, “Graces Kneading, Νo Οne is a Stranger: Social Sculpture in the Public Sphere”
A social and performative sculpture, Graces Kneading results from a collaboration between visual artist Adonis Volanakis and chef Manolis Papoutsakis, in dialogue with art curator Lydia Matthews. For the last twenty years, Volanakis has been researching the female experience through his works, and correspondingly, Papoutsakis has been exploring possible applications of philosophy to food. The goal of this collaborative team’s multiple artistic residencies in Megara was to connect with the life of the city. They were especially focused on actively listening to the voices of local women, who generously shared their experiences regarding evolving cultural traditions, locality and foreignness. These exchanges, some planned and some random, were augmented by visits to houses’ kitchens, local bakeries, recipe-sharing sessions and, ultimately, hands-on workshops featuring long hours of kneading, embellishing and baking bread around a round table. A traditional wood oven lights up and bakes the women’s visual/verbal messages into each loaf. Research conducted in the Archaeological Museum of Megara, the cultural association Theognis, farmers’ gardens and wineries of the area, also informed the project. At the archaeological museum, a site guarded by the wheat goddess Demeter, Volanakis became inspired by a 4th-century BC votive relief picturing the Three Graces. This image soon functioned as a catalyst for Graces Kneading, with its culminating public performance highlighting the living presence of three women dressed in white garments. Echoing the wedding dress as a sculpture and signifying object that has often appeared in Volanakis’ works, this social sculpture explores what it means for women to come together – without necessarily having previously established friendly or family relations – to collectively prepare bread and uniquely embellish each loaf as an offering to their broader community members. Long-established as women’s practices, the Megarian art of embellished bread-making may now raise new questions about the need for community connection, intergenerational interaction and exchange of familial experiences in both private and public settings. Can hospitality be radical, unconditional and absolute with Three Graces offering bread and wine?
16.15 – 16.30 Pablo Berzal Cruz – Ioanna Lioutsia – Αthena Stourna, “Nafplion Blues: Prison Stories. The Nafplion Prison as Brutal ‘Urban Scenography’”
The prison sites and their timeless presence in the city of Nafplion were the starting point for two distinct workshops for students of the undergraduate programme in the Department of Performing Digital Arts of the University of Peloponnese. The result of these workshops titled Nafplion Blues: Prison Stories was presented in the Prague Quadrennial of Performance Design and Space 2023 as part of the Greek student exhibition. Students of the module “Performance and space: the Audience, the Artist and Performance as a Meeting Ground” created the site-specific performance Listen-Watch-Βe Silent: performers and spectators participated in a pilgrimage procession to former prison sites in Nafplion (Palamidi, Vouleftikon, Bourtzi, Akronafplia). The module “Socially Engaged Performance III: Social Theatre” was held at the Agricultural Prison of Tiryns. After a series of theatre workshops, inmates and students presented the devised performance The Journeys of the Potato, from Andes to Tiryns: Legends and Truths to only two spectators and the prison guards. In the present paper, the workshop instructors Pablo Berzal Cruz, Ioanna Lioutsia and Athena Stourna will focus on the use of the prison – in the present and the past – as a performance space. This space oscillates between private and public space. Prisons, as the absolute dystopian places, function in both cases as “urban scenographies of the real” (Hannah 2022): from the Agricultural Prison of Tiryns’ hermetically sealed, private space to the open, public space of the historic city of Nafplion, where the buildings that once housed prisons are scattered throughout the city and accessible to all. In this type of “urban scenography” – freed from the constraints of the theatrical stage – the spectators and the performers are moved both emotionally and physically by its “intangible affective qualities” (Hann 2019, 5). Through the brutality emitted by the real substance of the sites, the “scenographic city” reveals stories and traumas, by removing the fake touristic scenery that is now covering it, while inviting spectators and creators to assume social and political responsibility (Lotker & Gough 2013, 6; Hannah 2022).
16.30 – 16.45 Αndreas Skourtis, “Designing from Space: Scenography and Performance Design at 1:1 Scale in Higher Education Teaching”
Space (public and private / theatre and non-theatre) is a powerful tool for creators in performance design. Often, inspiration comes from the existing space (not just hosted in it) and its on-site inhabitation and work at a 1:1 scale in the initial stages of creation. The scenographer/performance designer is often the author and initiator of the creative work. Scenographic practices are part of the contemporary and future heterarchical structures of the theatrical creation. How can we develop and include methodologies and practices, in relation to design principles like the above, in the teaching of scenography/performance design in higher education? Answers to the above question will be given in this presentation through examples of Andreas Skourtis’ work in the Scenography Cluster workshop he has led and teaches within the MA/MFA Advanced Theatre Practice graduate programme at the Royal Central School of Speech and Drama continuously since 2013.
Fourth Session
17.15 – 18.30 Performative Practices and Public Space
17.15 – 17.30 Εvi Prousali, “Fontana di Spinalonga. A Performance-Art Intervention in Public Space”
The performance titled Okeanos [Ocean] took place at the archaeological site of the island of Spinalonga, and included installations and constructions which altogether constitute the expanded scenography within which the scenic act was performed. Artists and spectators interacted with the site-specific constructions forming a community which, using these artefacts, critically (re)perceived history, memory, as well as the way the island is exploited as a tourist attraction. This approach allowed a revaluation of the archaeological site of Spinalonga based on what it represents as historical and cultural heritage. Landscape artist Alexandros Kaklamanos created the following scenographic props and constructions, which were placed at specific spots on the island: five replicas of ancient board games that were found on the island and which were used by the artists and spectators at the beginning of the performance; twelve tablets, placed on the floor of a ruined house, with digital images that looked at the spectators; a 1.2 metres high metallic amphora installed at the central courtyard which was used by the inhabitants as a gathering place; a large-size mirror, placed at the entrance of the island’s cemetery; the Venetian blazon of Spinalonga made of natural materials, placed on the floor of an empty cistern; an illuminated 3-dimensional metallic sign with the words Fontana di Spinalonga placed over the above mentioned empty cistern. The present paper analyses the extent and the degree to which these particular scenographic interventions on Spinalonga contributed to the performance’s goals: (a) to create raptures in the spectators’ perception of the historical, sociological and political connotations around the concept “Spinalonga”; (b) to open the discussion about the ideological segregation and marginalization of the respective “other” (leper, refugee) who have been expelled on this island diachronically, and (c) to activate a new, alternative way of perceiving this archaeological locale and its history.
17.30 – 17.45 Μaro Galani, “Mnemonic Performance Writings: The Project Performance Writing at the First Cemetery of Patras”
The cemetery forms a special “site” of the modern urban environment. It is a site of culture as having value historical, architectural and cultural heritage, collective identity and memory/mneme, inextricably linked to the city. Nowadays, again, there is an interest in issues of memory/mneme in artistic practices, literature, public events and everyday behaviour. This interest reflects the need for the authentic, the unique, the preserved. Often this need is manifested, in the urban environment, through cognition with imagination and action with creativity. It is in this context that the attempt to welcome burial grounds as intimate public spaces. The contemporary monumentality of the cemetery, as a spatial and aesthetic experience, becomes interesting as an intermediate urban space that diffuses meanings and develops connections with the past and the future of the city. It is a vector of expression, projection of perceptions, values and ideology. Overcoming the tension between theological and rational beliefs about the treatment of death and its rituals, the cemetery is a “sculpture gallery of memory/mneme” and creates a place that tries to contain grief through the concept of memorialization. Cemeteries thus tend to be suitable places for artistic and/or educational activities. In the first part of the paper, the concepts related to performance writing and memory/mneme are explored, and the theoretical positions that substantiate the claim that the cemetery, as a space of the dead, is associated with a collective subject forced to confront the fact of death are sought. The second part concerns the design and implementation of performance writing in the cemetery. As a kind of participatory design, it deals with the possibility of setting up a framework for action to encourage participation and creativity. The openness of the design to experience prompts the collective subject to engage in poetic walking/walking as a means of exploring, reading and redefining the landscape and searching for inspiration for performance writing, in the space of cemetery and cemetery art. It prompts the individual to perceive themselves in the space, as opposed to the usual role they take on.
17.45 – 18.00 Εleni Gini, “Promenade Performance or How Memory Acquires a Body in Public Space”
This paper presentation endeavours to treat the much-discussed and multifaceted topic of memory as it is imprinted, verbalized and “embodied” at an individual and a collective level and transferred onto public space through the performative action of promenade performance. The occasion for this analysis was provided by the promenade performance Memory-Liberation which took place in Patras, (on 38 November, 2023) composed, directed and choreographed by Maro Galani. Within its architectural, social and natural environs, the city guided the steps of the performers (actors, both professional and amateur) so that they experience and convey to the performer-spectator(s?) emblematic moments of its history. The promenade performance through the signifier of micro-history/the hearth focuses on macro-history/the homeland, having as its signifying material personal testimonies, recorded and written documents, improvised verses about love and resistance, excerpts from contemporary literary texts, music and dance, including rap music. The event of the liberation of Patras from the Nazi occupation operates as the venture’s generative cause, prompting the performers to wander through landmark spots and retrieve memory fields expressed through the confessional language of poetry (and of performance writing.) Our presentation recommends the case of the promenade performance in the context of conceptualizing an expanded set-design: the acting agents move through the landscape as a unitary, performative body which does more than merely reenact. Rather, it operates between the registers of the symbolic and the real, offering the possibility of distance from the there and then and creating meaning and ‘methexis’ with the receiver-spectator in the here and now. The experience of the body in the space which hosted the (historical) trauma and its healing, the dialogues which allude to History, the poetic utterance which retrieves elements of individual memory, accentuate the manner in which reflection is expressed through the collective body, traverses public space and is offered for assessment, passing from the emotive function to the intellect, from informational to experienced.
18.00 – 18.15 Dimitris Dimopoulos, “Performance and Musical Theatre: Performances of the Opera-Performance Sun and Sea in Venice (2019) and Athens (2021)”
The opera-performance Sun and Sea is a musical-theatre performance that was originally written to be performed in repetition with the audience entering freely and moving around at will. Its first presentations were held in public spaces and this paper presentation explores these initial presentations and how the opera-performance evolved in its later iterations, studying its premiere at the Venice Biennale in an old Navy warehouse and how the conditions of the COVID-19 pandemic influenced its presentation at the Athens Festival. As Sun and Sea takes place on a public beach, it is analysed at the same time how the public space that is depicted is reshaped according to the respective conditions noted in the studied presentations.
Fifth Session
18.45 – 21.00 Site-Specific Dance Practices
18.45 – 19.00 Patricia Αpergi, “Dance MyS+eries / Season 2: The U(R)TOPIAS Academy of Choreography in Elefsina”
The U(R)TOPIAS Academy of Choreography in collaboration with 2023 ELEUSIS European Capital of Culture presented a three-hour site-specific performance in the city of Elefsina. Dance MyS+eries 2 opens the dialogue with six new choreographers and mapping a new route in the city. The work was divided into different episodes, composed of the work of each choreographer. Each piece was a different station, and each station illuminated a hidden aspect of the city, inviting the audience on a journey through the time and place of Elefsina. The guest visitors became the initiators of a contemporary ritual-path introducing the city of Elefsina through the aspect of dance. How much did the neighbourhood keep hidden and how much did it let show? The rich history of Elefsina, its people, its buildings and its neighbourhoods were brought together in a thread that attempted to trace a new route in the city, to illuminate the less visible parts of the city and to open a dialogue with the public space. The PYRKAL factory, the women workers, the refugees, the cement, the Paneleusiniakos football team, the balconies, the children’s toys, the great strike of Kronos factory, the homeless man Panagiotis Farmakis, the courtyards, the celebrations, the love stories, the sorrows, became the primary source of research. Small fragments of images and stories created a collective way of storytelling.
19.00 – 19.15 Εlian Roumie, “25km”
Eliane Roumié started her artistic research into the concept of the ritual by wandering through the city of Eleusis, a place historically linked to the elevation of the spirit as well as the destruction of nature. At this very place, thousands of years ago, ancient Greeks celebrated the Eleusinian Mysteries in honour of the goddess Demeter and Persephone. Although the Mysteries were one of the most prestigious religious ceremonies in Ancient Greece, their focus was not on the Gods but on humans. A notable part of the Mysteries was the Procession of nearly 10.000 people which followed the Sacred Way from Athens to Eleusis to pursue a new, enriched life devoid of fear. 25km is a site-specific project inspired by the city of Eleusis. Four women follow the steps of Ancient Greeks and walk in silence for 25 kilometres in search of new personal and collective meanings. The project focuses on the immense experience provided by a long walking route and further explores ways in which such a practice can be translated into dance. 25km consists of an artistic documentary, an artistic map and a dance performance. The emotion of anticipation felt at the starting point, the ephemeral contact with nature, the need for catharsis, and the prolonged anticipation of arrival, all represent aspects of the piece’s extensive research and form the basis for the composition of 25km’s collective ritual. The project was realized in the framework of the 2023 ELEUSIS European Capital of Culture and the U(r)topias Academy of Choreography. 25km was supported by the Cultural and Development Non-Profit Organization NEON through its Annual Grants Programme. Concept – Choreography: Eliane Roumié. Performance: Nancy Nerantzi, Zoi Efstathiou, Marina Tsapekou, Eliane Roumié. Music – Sound Design: Manos Paterakis. Cinematography – Editing: Konstantinos Kalavrezos. Dramaturgy Advisors: Rodia Vomvolou, Dimitra Mitropoulou, Roberto Frattini. Scenography: Stavros Balis. Graphics: Giannis Shinas.
19.15 – 19.30 George Papadopoulos, “Polluted – Don’t Look”
In my dance practice – and this presentation– the focus has been on the people of Elefsina and their attempt to create a better world. My reference goes back to the era of intense industrialization and its long-lasting consequences that have created a grim environmental predicament for the whole community of Elefsina. The next generations may now live under the delusion that they are safely on their way to a better future. Whilst, at the same time, people are overwhelmed by the dystopic reality of their present: the climate and atmosphere have changed to an unsuitable environment for the healthy living of a human organism. Past and present generations have dangerously accustomed themselves to this polluted environment, growing up and learning to survive in it. If we do not change these hostile environmental conditions, this paradoxical accustomization over the years will inevitably result in our self-destructive extinction. Through my work, I try to create the image of a man-creature who lives by inhaling air through a plastic bottle. Even though the bottle causes him to suffocate, he is under the illusion that he cannot live without it. At the same time, the bottle for me represents also what’s left of the breathable air in Elefsina, visualizing it as a true lung of this city. With this symbolic exaggeration in the concept and kinetic vocabulary of my site-specific performance, I try to raise awareness for the predicament of Elefsina – as well as the wider pressing environmental issues–, hopefully putting forward a much-needed change of perspective. The project was realized in the framework of the 2023 ELEUSIS European Capital of Culture and the U(R)TOPIAS Academy of Choreography. Concept- Choreography- Performer: George Papadopoulos.
19.30 – 19.45 Emmanuela Sakellari, “Dealing with Fireworks”
Taking as an example the two years of artistic research carried out within the programme of the U(R)TOPIAS Academy of Choreography in Elefsina, we will talk about the practices used in order to create a site-specific project in the public space of the city. The artistic research draws elements from the industrial history of the city and how we could draw elements from the environment and the lives of the inhabitants so that we could connect the dance work with the city today. The methodology and tools used are: a) theoretical research: industrial history, interviews with cultural associations, research about locations that are landmarks of the city, interviews with workers in the industries, meetings and discussions with different groups about how they envision their city; b) kinetic research: patterns of movement in labour, and how we are inspired by them to transfer them to the universe of the work; how the concept of explosions is transferred to the body; experimentation with the conditions of contraction, alertness and movement reaction speeds; how the body resists its environment; kinetic research in the public space of the city so that the environment itself creates the conditions of the movement. The relation between the location and the work was particularly important: for the location, we were interested in the contrast of scales, i.e. a large, vast space, where the dancers appear small concerning the environment. The site appears as a skeleton from the industrial past while at the same time giving the impression of being something unfinished, giving space for something new to be born. The architecture of the space has clear geometric boundaries, a sea horizon, a large scale and a combination of industrial and natural elements. During the creative process, we researched the relationships of distance and what this can bring to the work, the inhabitation of the space, and the routes that either faithfully follow the geometry of the space or work contrary to it.
19.45 – 20.00 Κaterina Foti, “The Kitchen Dance_A House Trance Vocabulary”
Kaiti is a woman who lives almost exclusively in her kitchen. There, her past, present and future pass before her eyes by association and are transformed into a universal and collective female narrative. Exploring the dimension of leisure and its existence in a suffocating everyday environment defined exclusively by the restriction of work, the choreographer contacted women from the cultural associations of Elefsina, all of them workers, wives and mothers. Their testimonies and narratives led her to the nuclear and universal place in which leisure and work coexist in a delicate balance: the kitchen. Although fully identified with domestic work, the kitchen is also a place of female confession far from social criticism. It is a prison of endless manual work – often an additional task for the already working woman – and a family hearth, and at the same time, it becomes a place of worship, a meeting place and a place of celebration, as well as a place where a woman can take stock of a whole life and set up a small personal revolution. The project was realized in the framework of the 2023 ELEUSIS European Capital of Culture and the U(R)TOPIAS Academy of Choreography. Concept – Choreography – Performance: Katerina Foti. Original music: Jan Van Angelopoulos. Set design: Gina Iliopoulou. Costume design: Lina Stavropoulou. Lighting design: Stevi Koutsothanasi. Trailer: Tasos Goletsos. Photography: Anastasia Giannaki.
20.00 – 20.15 Diamanto Chatzizacharia, “Dunk”
Dunk negotiates the idea of change that occurs in the community and the landscape of a town. It examines the topic from the perspective of young people (Gen Z) and specifically how their effort for personal growth affects their environment and by extension the town they live in. Dunk reflects a hopeful attempt at change and reshaping through a chaotic harmony of young - and tireless - bodies. The piece draws inspiration from the city of Elefsina and the transformations it has undergone in the last hundred years. The research focuses on the city’s society, which was mostly formed by people of different origins. The multiculturalism that described the community of Eleusis for decades resulted in a young generation of locals with an identity crisis. While the past is still evident in the city landscape, given over to the ravages of time, young people are redefining their identity and dreaming of a better future for their hometown. They recognize the inevitable change that accumulates over time and they continue to shape Elefsina both in its landscape and in the core of its society. The movement material emerges from the routine of young people in the town: from daily walks and team sports to nightlife parties, while the repetitiveness of the work becomes a symbol of their continuous effort for personal development. The performers invite the audience to participate in their chaotic gathering, creating an ephemeral community very reminiscent of that of Eleusis: affected by the interaction of its people and always welcoming change. Credits: Choreography: Diamanto Hadjizacharia. Music: Alexandros Christofidis. Performance: Eleftheria Agapaki, Sofia Anastasiou, Ioanna Karategou, Maritina Katsimpraki. With the generous participation of Eleusinian people from the Cultterra team. A production of 2023 ELEUSIS European Capital of Culture. The piece was created in the frame of the U(R)TOPIAS Academy of Choreography, an initiative of Aerites Dance Company.
20.15 – 20.30 Christiana Kosiari, “Bouboulines”
Bouboulines is a dance work inspired by the repetitive movements of female labourers in the factories of Elefsina. The women who worked in the factories during their peak were often referred to as “Bouboulines”, named after the most important woman who participated in the 1821 Greek revolution against the Ottomans. In the piece four women over the age of sixty-five gather around a table, representing a place of shared experiences and collaboration. It is a space for work, discussion, song, female empowerment, revolution, and celebration. Taking inspiration from the mechanical movements of labour performed by these women, the piece transforms and modifies these movements into a new kinetic vocabulary, where the four women turn them into a dance of friendship, affection, and love. The performers are not professional dancers but rather women from everyday life – our mothers, aunts, and grandmothers – who embody all the women who have toiled, strengthened themselves, and may have retired but still live every moment with the spirit of a child. Four performances of Bouboulines were mounted as part of the 2023 ELEUSIS Cultural Capital of Europe at the U(R)TOPIAS Academy of Choreography on June 29, 30, July 1 and 2 2023. Credits: Concept: Christiana Kosiari, Performance – Collaboration: Maria-Angela Katsikali-Kosiari, Niki Filianou, Aphrodite Kapala, Matta Koulouridi, Original Music Composition: Jan Van Angelopoulos, Costume Advisor: Lina Stavropoulou, Video – Montage: Grigoris Panopoulos.
Thursday 18 April
Sixth Session
9.00 – 10.30 Performative and Educational Practices
9.00 – 9.15 Ilia Lakidou, “Performance in Public Space and Educational Experiences”
This paper presentation discusses the results of a qualitative survey among the students of the Department of Theatre Studies NKUA, who participated in the Prague Quadrennial PQ23 exhibition. The research was done through an online anonymous questionnaire among undergraduate and graduate students who took relevant elective courses during the academic years 2021-22 and 2022-23. The courses in question offered new learning experiences to the students who participated in them, especially if they were engaged in the performances that were part of the exhibition of the Department of Theatre Studies NKUA in PQ23. The research seeks to discover whether these courses and participation in PQ23 provided new learning experiences and to what extent they enabled the scientific and psychosocial development of the participants. It also examines to what extent the teaching activity in question changed the students’ perceptions of performance, public space and, in general, the role of art in organizing critical thinking about the political dimensions of the artistic intervention.
9.15 – 9.30 Vangelis Arvanitis – Anna-Αlkinoi Μiliopoulou Kompouri– Αlexis Τsiamoglou, “Performance Between Detention and Teaching. Radical Uncertainty in the Prison School Class”
According to the EU Prison Regulation (2006), imprisonment should only mean “restriction of movement to another place”. The prisoner remains a subject of rights. The prison must ensure good living conditions (housing, food, hygiene, dignity, socialisation, entertainment) as well as high-level educational opportunities. With this in mind, we designed the artistic-educational program I Dream at the 3rd Second Chance School at the Thessaloniki Correctional Facility (Diavata Prison), which revolved around the concept of narrative performativity. Narrative performativity questions hierarchical organisation in the production of a final work. Our goal was to create a collective experience that addressed the students’ wishes and accepted a foundational condition of radical uncertainty in the activities performed. Performances were structured around the tensions in three basic relationships: inside-outside (home vs condition of detention), prisoner-citizen-migrant (rights, opportunities vs responsibilities, limitations), personal narrative of life-production of collective work (method of expression vs method of composition). Through the variety of expressive means (movement/dance, visual arts, constructions, oral narrations– structured creative writing), an attempt was made to combine the possibility of open-ended creative content with a tight cognitive structure for the production of specific and concrete final works. As we passed from one medium of expression to another, we treated dreaming as a mental state, as protest, as a bridge towards freedom, and as a personal and social mandate. The project led the team to conclude that performativity, which is embodied, actively physical and situated, is a necessary complement to current prison education curricula that prioritise practice-based training as well as linguistic and mathematical literacies.
9.30 – 9.45 Ιoli Andreadi – Κοrnilia Poulopoulou, “Performance and Brain: Towards a Pedagogical Utilization”
Professor Erin Hurley has worked on mirror neurons, arguing that, through direct activation from observed events, the viewer’s mind “functions like a small theatre, producing representations of action and emotion that are not necessarily performed by their audience, but are in any case experienced electrically by them”. There is a, broader, recent interest in understanding through a new perspective the performance and, subsequently, its pedagogical use. Where might such a turn – which seems entirely new – of performance and its pedagogy towards neuroscience have its roots? Can specific references to the Platonic cave, Freud, Antonin Artaud’s speech and action, Stanislavski, shed some light on this genealogy? And to what axes might a pedagogical valorisation of the dialogue between Performance and Brain Space be directed today?
9.45 – 10.00 Clio Fanouraki, “Is There a ‘Monster’ Here… A Walking Interactive Promenade Performance Based on the Artistic Interventions at the School of Philosophy NKUA”
This paper presentation will address the process of creating two interactive promenade-research pieces, based on site-specific performance elements, on the occasion of the visual arts interventions at the School of Philosophy of the University of Athens, as well as the qualitative research methodologies, based on the art of theatre that took place, both at the stage of conception-creation, performance and at the stage of the parallel research recording of the action. Third- and fourth-year students of the Department of Theatre Studies NKUA, participate in the action, in the context of their training in the pedagogy and teaching of theatre, and more specifically to discover in practice the concept of co-creation and performance, co-decision, communication, as well as the elements of management of members of a larger or smaller creative group and their own “role” in it. Specific objectives concern the stages of conception and creation of scripts (improvised or not) and performances, based on “scores and techniques of devised theatre as well as mixed techniques of site-specific-promenade actions and inter-artistic pretexts, such as the artworks created within the Schoοl of Philosophy. Ultimately, Is There a “Monster” Here… transformed and transmuted into intercultural and interdisciplinary forms of personal and social development of the group members, based on the present promenade action and the encounter with the “monster”, the one who is “inside or outside” of any kind of immersion in theatrical creation.
10.00 – 10.15 Dimitra Nikolopoulou, “The Walking Antigone”
According to Cornelius Kastoriadis, Antigone is “the tragedy with the greatest political depth” as it relates, like no other, to the essence of the city and its political expression. In this presentation, Sophocles’ Antigone functions as a springboard for reflection and artistic experimentation, inspiring itinerant investigations and site-specific performances in the centre and peripheral neighbourhoods of Athens. Concepts such as justice, law, ethics, public opinion, prejudice, injustice, favouritism, and impartiality are explored by performers and groups of walkers in the modern urban landscape of the capital. Here the moving, walking body emerges as a field of expression, solidarity, a means of assertion, emancipation, acceptance, gender identity, a meeting place with diversity, but also a place of otherness. The paper presentation records different itinerant approaches and mappings of the capital through the prism of the political body and the characters of Sophocles’ drama with the participation of members of the Performance Workshops (Greek National Theatre) from 2022 until today (The Backbone Project, My Beloved Creon, and others), but also individual wanderings of the artist in districts and neighbourhoods of the city, where she was born and lives. The myth of Antigone therefore turns into a stimulus for the creation of performative events. The locations of the implemented projects vary: Areopagus, Alexandra Avenue Refugees, Elena Maternity Hospital (near the avenue), Kolonaki, Omonia, etc. After all, myth “is above all speech, a system of communication that with its immediacy, simplicity and clarity approaches each of us” (Roland Barthes, Mythologies), and “a source of allegorical instructions for the formation of the individual and his social group” (Emile Durkheim in Paul Fargues).
10.45 – 11.45 Keynote Speech
10.45 – 11.25 Dorita Hannah, “RELEASE THE FURIES: Theatre Has Left the Building – Pursuing the Scenographic ‘Real’”
It wasn’t so long ago that we negotiated the city as self-organising citizens: free from security fencing, stanchion barriers, fluoro-orange traffic cones and proliferating signage; all performative markers designed to regulate our individual and collective movement. This new normal, which signals impending catastrophe and therefore a precarious existence, not only limits how we engage with the urban environment but curtails spontaneous self-expression and risk-taking while disregarding the city’s multiple histories, cultural mythologies and socio-political realities. And yet, recent incidents on a highly mediatized global stage have revealed a hyper-theatricalization of everyday life, blurring the boundaries between fact and fiction. This is accompanied by a tendency for contemporary theatre to leave the “dead air” of its designated buildings, seeking “the R/real” in all its manifestations – from the city’s material reality to a sublime and inexplicable engagement with the unrepresentable Real (with a capital “R”), which Jacques Lacan defined as an “impossible” real that defies symbolization and language. In her keynote, Prof. Dorita Hannah presents a range of key performance projects, including her collaborative dance-architecture events, in order to consider how challenging well-established binaries –between safety and danger, mythos and materiality, theatre and city– can enrich urban development with opportunities for enhancing liminal scenographic encounters.
Seventh Session
11.45 – 13.00 Performative Practices, New Media and Public Space
11.45 – 12.00 Αngeliki Pοulou, “The Concept of the ‘Common’ and its Performance in Contemporary Art: Digital Artworks and Installations in Athens”
This paper presentation aims to elucidate the intricate dynamics and inherent contradictions within contemporary art practices situated in public spaces, particularly concerning the concept of the “common”. Central themes to be explored include the cultivation of interpersonal relationships, the collective work of art, the sense of collective identity, “togetherness”, and spatial occupation and utilization. The contemporary deficit of participation in the political community, in the processes of organizing collective and individual life, evolves simultaneously with the exaggeration of participation in the production of spectacle. Fundamental inquiries arise regarding the contemporary interpretations of “community”, “collective”, and “collectivity”. Additionally, the examination extends to scrutinizing the evolving role of art in fostering communal cohesion amidst the post-digital landscape, characterized by the coexistence of analogue and digital modalities, data and corporeality, and the fusion of artificial and natural elements within a framework of perpetual flux and disorder. What challenges arise? Are hybrid artworks/technologies and performative practices in public space capable of shaping and activating local communities? Around which processes and protocols are actual artistic communities structured? How do they interact with local communities? Ultimately, what do they produce? This announcement is situated at the intersection of performance art and digital media, with a specific focus on the performative multimedia oeuvre of the Medea Electronique Art Collective within the urban landscape of Athens spanning the years 2013 to 2017. Additionally, it draws upon the seminal exhibitions of documenta 14 in 2017 and Plasmata 2022 at Pedion tou Areos by Onassis Stegi.
12.00 – 12.15 Εmmanouela Vogiatzaki-Krukowski, “Space, Place and the Scenographic Body in the Context of Telematics and Videocentrism”
Since we are talking about expanded scenography as a component of artistic action, it means that we have moved from the theatrical space to other places that have equally and/or more narrative and aesthetic dynamics than that of the conventional stage. Often, such transitions highlight the body, not only as a dynamic narrative medium but also as a place that contains and reflects meanings. Such a body could be a remarkable component of the scenographic canvas, or even be a canvas itself. This is the scenographic body with performative powers; a body that could be seen as a private ‘place’ sometimes surrounded by public spaces, sometimes not. Such a condition, namely the performative body having scenographic dynamics, is often found in performance art and indeed has contributed greatly to what McKinney and Palmer say, that scenography is increasingly becoming an autonomous practice, as it can happen anywhere. This presentation focuses on the relationships and dynamics that develop between the space, the place and the body to create a performance and/or performance art in the context of telematics and video centrism, with a greater emphasis on, but not limited to, artistic works created during the COVID-19 pandemic. Based on this rationale, we will study artistic actions and/or events created both in Greece and abroad, such as: Rattling Frames by Anna Laskari, Forced Memories by Emmanouela Vogiatzaki-Krukowski, Telematic Quarantine by Paul Sermon, and others.
12.15 – 12.30 Βill Psarras, “City as a Performative and Augmented Object / Situation: Walking, Transmitting, Performing Site-Gestures in Contemporary Art Practices”
City constitutes a condition of multiple approaches; a place of drifting, of collection, of observation, of conflict, of performance, of transmission – an architectural grid, a space of flows, an aesthetic situation, a social hub and a dynamic ballet of communication and practices. The aesthetic implications of walking through various aspects of flanerie, psychogeography and performative practices, shaped a strong foundation since the early 20th century, which in relation to the technologically advanced public space, revealed hybrid spaces, narratives and stages. The city is often grasped through metaphors of the human body, memory, textiles and computer interface among others. The current paper presentation aims to offer a series of reflections on the city as a performative and augmented object/situation by focusing on spaces of transition (streets, rooftops, crossings, platforms) through selected performance artworks (including one by the author), which blend processes of walking, transmission, recording, annotation and talking; revealing new hybrid landscapes and urban poetics.
12.30 – 12.45 Κostis Stafylakis, “Goblin Mode: Transformations of Artistic LARP (Live Action Role-Playing) Gaming in Contemporary Art and Fine Arts Education”
A significant number of art projects associated with so-called post-internet art focused on the inescapable condition of “self-curation” engendered by the uninterrupted connectivity of web users, social media, and prevalent content-sharing platforms. Seeking tools to navigate the uncharted abyss of Web 2.0, artists turned to various gaming cultures, such as LARP (Live Action Role-Playing). In discussion with the work of artists such as Brody Condon, Ed Fornieles, Jon Rafman, Susan Ploetz, OMSK Social Club, and others, Kostis Stafylakis and Theo Triantafyllidis produced the serialized work Readiness Saga (2019-), a series of live role-playing games on timely doomsday and post-apocalyptic scenarios: from the rumours of an upcoming American civil war to the predictions of an impending planetary collapse. The most recent episode of this serialized work was The Horde: Goblin Mode (2023), a three-day LARP occupying the arena of the Overkill festival (Netherlands, 2023). In the game, characters designed after fantasy culture, such as elves and goblins, were transformed into defenders of colliding ecological scenarios. Studio 11 of the Athens School of Fine Arts organized a parallel LARP entitled The Horde: Doomer Mode, live-streamed at the Overkill, accommodating the online interaction between the players of the two sister LARPs. The processes of these artistic LARPs produced interactions, spontaneous and choreographed rituals, materialities, assemblies, manifestoes, etc. What does this experimentation contribute to the juncture of the narrative with the performative?
Eighth Session
13.15 – 14.45 Art Practices and Public Space
13.15 – 13.30 Georgia Sagri, “Stage of Recovery”
The work features a medium-sized stage, with dimensions of 250 cm by 250 cm and a height of 65 cm. Four large, thick pillows are placed on top, attached to the base, and securely covered with cotton fabric. It can accommodate the activities of the participant and sometimes myself and is only used during one-on-one sessions. During the sessions, the participant is on the stage, mainly alone, exposing themselves, and their condition, on the stage, as they are accustomed to doing in everyday life, with a slight difference: here they work on the condition that caused them pain. I am around the stage, and I can see what is happening, and how the movements progress. Sometimes I will ask the participant to repeat a technique, to continue, to take time and rest. The stage is soft, it is there to remind them that there may be a place that can be soft and easy, a place where, instead of performing a social role, they can release the tension created by that same role they have created for themselves to perform in their daily lives. Instead of creating even greater difficulty than they already have, the process helps them navigate ways to release difficulties. What started in the past with my need to prepare and recover from physically and mentally demanding performance works gradually became a study of the physical, pathological conditions of the body in the hyper-capitalist era that condemns us to autoimmune diseases, stress, discomfort, asthma, insomnia, panic, anxiety, fatigue, nausea, eating disorders, mania, paranoia, arthritis, depression, addiction, to name but a few. Over the years, I realized that some of my techniques (breathing, movement, voice) could help others build their self-recovery routine. If in the past this practice was a preparatory part of my creative process within the medium of performance, it is now a research practice that I share in the form of individual sessions in my studio.
13.30 – 13.45 Danae Theodoridou, “Performance as a Frame for Generating Public Space”
This paper presentation will discuss the newly proposed term “publicing” as analyzed in my recent book Publicing: Practising Democracy Through Performance (Nissos, 2022). Following previous conceptual propositions for approaching the relationship between art, its audience and society – such as those of “relational aesthetics” (Bourriaud 1998) or the “social turn” in art (Bishop 2006) – “publicing” will be discussed as a term and practice that can more fully express the way art can generate public space and “public time” (Castoriadis 1997) today. Departing from an understanding of politics as “appearing to others as others appear [to me]” (Schneider 2017), the paper will examine how participatory (but not only) artist structures can construct an alternative (to capitalist) public space through the embodied, sensorial processes that they propose. The paper will draw on specific examples and practices from my five-year-long artistic research on “the practice of democracy”, and will discuss four working principles through which an artwork can function as an act of “publicing”.
13.45 – 14.00 Μariela Νestora, “YELP danceco.’s Artistic Practices in Public Space From Claiming to Caring”
Researcher/choreographer Mariela Nestora presents YELP danceco.’s artistic practices and performances in public space from 2010 to the present moment, reflecting on how the different practices responded to their “time”: from public activations in squares and walks in the city centre to the more recent environmental awareness performances in gardens. The first phase of YELP danceco.’s public space works – from 2010-2017 – includes walks, activations of abandoned buildings, durational performances and public interventions. The majority of these projects were created through open calls for performers-participants, artists and citizens of different ages and experiences. With the aim to activate and reclaim public space through artistic practices as well as creating an experience for the audience, these performances responded to particular characteristics of the site, weaving into the choreography the history and socio-political significance of the site in its past and current use (360 degrees walk in the city of Kalamata, Two steps further down through arcades towards Omonia, everybodies audio guided performance in Exarchia Square and 20 pencils no.2 durational performance in Arsaki Gallery). The second phase of YELP danceco.’s public space works, from 2017 to date, includes participatory workshops, open-source score-based projects and performances in gardens (Fieldwork scores, performance Discreetly distinct, C7). These projects emerged out of the artistic research within the post-human choreography field that expands subjectivity beyond the human, emphasizing the role of more-than-human agents. Specifically exploring our relationship with plants, aware that relationships of significant otherness transform those who relate and the worlds in which they live, as suggested by Maria Puig de la Bellacasa, in these creations, choreography as an expanded practice becomes a means to produce a common, a shared place, an experience, testing the potential of performance as a site of sympoiesis as defined by Donna Haraway.
14.00 – 14.15 Philippos Hager, “Mapping Geographies of Globalization: The Global City and ‘Portable Dramaturgies’ ”
As per Saskia Sassen’s discussion, the Global City is the ground upon which we can trace processes that constitute and are constituted by the condition globalisation in its most “concrete [and] localized form” (2005: 40): the ground, in other words, upon which globalisation as a social, political, economic, and cultural experience is performed. As such, the global-urban fabric emerges as the site that both shapes and is shaped by globalised subjects; a site of multiplicities and difference, whose every (local) appearance stages in no uncertain terms the questions, claims and inequalities of globalisation. In this way, the global-urban fabric appears as the stage par excellence of the geography of globalisation; a stage, as Sassen suggests, where “the formation of new claims, by both the powerful and the disadvantaged, materializes” (Ibid.). Taking the above thoughts as a point of departure, in this paper I trace how certain “mobile dramaturgies” map this geography of globalisation – practices such as the ones employed by Rimini Protokoll, Lola Arias, Dries Verhoeven and Blast Theory – that, although in different ways, invite audiences to drift along some aspect of the global city. Practices, moreover, whose common trait is their ability to be applied in different cities, while they can mount theatre spaces or occur in the urban fabric. In this framework, I ask: what kind of geographies do such “mobile dramaturgies” perform? What subjects inhabit them? How do they experience the contradictions and inequalities of globalisation? What spaces do they perform and what claims do they project upon them? If, finally, the global city is indeed the stage where globalisation is played out, what kinds of urban scenarios do they perform?
14.15 – 14.30 Panayiota Konstantinakou – Αnastasia Chatziliadou, “Silk (2016), a Performative Site-Specific Intervention in the Silk Industry Chrysalis of Goumenissa or ‘How Far Can a cocoon that Unwinds Go?’”
This paper presentation will examine the project Silk (2016) by the artistic group Drosa Techni (director: Anastasia Chatziliadou, dramaturg: Panayiota Konstantinakou and virtual environment artist: Stathis Mitsios) in collaboration with the theatre group The Troupe of Dreams, which took place in the abandoned silk factory of Goumenissa, Kilkis, as an example of performative site-specific intervention in a cultural heritage site. The project was held in the summer of 2016 at the original premises of the Chrysalis silk factory on the outskirts of the town, which closed its doors in the 1980s, and was immediately designated a historical monument by the state but was soon abandoned to decay. Silk, adopting the format of a site-specific theatre documentary, actively engaged the local community, revived cultural memory as well as discussed issues of everyday life. The paper will explore how Silk has served as a meeting place for cultural and social landscapes and narratives. Taking the building of the silk factory as a starting point, amateur actors from the local theatre group, as well as local citizens (mainly former female workers of the silk factory in question), and architects rewrote, with their bodies, images, sounds and narratives, personal and collective memories on the canvas of the abandoned building, articulating thus the demand that the building, repurposed, be returned to the local community.
Ninth Session
16.00 – 17.30 Performance Practices in the Public Sphere: Global Practices
16.00 – 16.15 Μelita Couta, “Movable Buildings – Unmovable Memories: The Political Space as Spectacle”
This paper presentation examines the role of scenographic methodologies in revisiting spaces related to political conflict and trauma. The speaker, Melita Couta presents her artistic research and design process behind the art installation Spectators in a Ghost City, the exhibition of the Cyprus National participation in Prague Quadrennial PQ23 which was awarded with the Golden Triga Award. The art installation places the occupied city of Famagusta in Cyprus, a contested space, a place of historical memory that turns into a spectacle against its own will. The analysis of the space through a scenographic lens allows for a careful examination of the materiality of the city and becomes the source of artistic creation. Focusing on the scenographic process of reducing space to miniatures, the sculptural maquettes and walking performance presented in Prague are approached as symbolic objects and symbolic actions to communicate issues of displacement and the politics of space, surveillance and agency. In this sense, scenographic methodologies are discussed as thinking processes, political acts of resistance, a tool for negotiating artistic practices and real spaces of conflict. The speaker defines this process as “scenography reversed” where a real place is understood as a dramaturgical scene, thereby allowing alternative understandings that extend beyond hegemonic narratives. The art installation and by extension the research and concept development behind the artistic presentation, places Famagusta as a paradigm of contested spaces and examines whether scenographic methodologies can be a possible approach for reconciliation and conflict resolution practices.
16.15 – 16.30 Αvra Sidiropoulou, “The Dramaturgy of Border. Physical and Mental Lines and Theatrical Utopias as Sites of Political, Cultural and Ideological Performance”
Being the only divided capital of Europe, the city of Nicosia has hosted several performative projects that resonate with Cyprus’ collective traumas and most notably the island’s invasion in 1974 by Turkish troops. In the past few years, increasingly daring theatre experiments have tried to heal the country’s open wounds by busting the identity taboo that has plagued many of its citizens. The physical border of the “Green Line” in the Buffer Zone that separates the southern from the northern part, “us” from “the others,” constitutes a deeply ambivalent and psychologically fraught locus of performance where the current dystopia of division and the envisioning of cultural “recentering” through the reunification of the Greek-Cypriot and the Turkish-Cypriot communities are relentlessly interrogated. This paper discusses cultural geopolitics in Cyprus intending to explore how emergent artists of the country’s contemporary theatre landscape have tackled the troubled national Cypriot identity, the experience of conflict and the prospect of reconciliation by revisiting and reviewing the contested site of the border through a theatrical lens. I will be discussing two recent productions directed by younger-generation Greek-Cypriot theatre-makers Magdalena Zira and Kostas Silvestros, which stage the trauma of separation at the most contested physical site of the island, namely, the Buffer Zone. Zira’s rendering of Euripides’ Iphigenia at Aulis in 2017 and Silvestros’ 2021 production of Beckett’s Waiting for Godot using Greek-Cypriot and Turkish-Cypriot actors who deliver the text in their respective dialects have combined the existential with the political by manipulating the symbolic significance of space and manoeuvring the audience’s ideological preconceptions and reformulating their nostalgia. Both productions challenge the two sides’ hegemonic narratives, using a hard physical border as a site of contestedness that must be overcome. In Zira’s Iphigenia at Aulis, the Greek army is stalled at Aulis/Buffer Zone, a “Dead Zone” where dreams, disappointments and aspirations are projected, waiting for favourable winds to sail. In Silverstros’ production of Waiting for Godot, Vladimir and Estragon’s wait becomes metonymic of the futility of the divided country’s yearning for a way out of the impasse, round after round of failed reconciliation talks.
16.30 – 16.45 Grigoris Ioannidis, “Sonic Postcards From Mexico: A Performance on the Sounds of a Silent City”
In 2016, Felix Blume, Despina Papagiotopoulou and Diego Aguirre’s bold project in Mexico City involved wandering through the city’s infamous neighbourhoods to produce a “pirate CD” of its silenced sounds, which they would then distribute themselves to subway passengers. The “pirate CD” contained the sounds and voices of a public space that could not (or did not want to) hear its counterpart: sounds of working-class people and the retailers, the voices of beggars or the cries of madmen framed a world in constant movement and deliberate isolation. After being exhibited in Mexico (Ambulant Polyphony, Fonoteca Nacional, Mexico City, 2016), the work was subsequently transferred in the form of a sound installation in New York (Sonic Postcards from Mexico City, The Mexican Cultural Institute of New York, 2018), and extremely recently provided the basis for a book by Harvard music performance professor Alejandro L. Madrid. This paper presentation attempts to transfer the experience of this performance to the public space; it documents its dynamics and wishes to propose a similar project for the streets of Athens.
16.45 – 17.00 Olga Papazafeiropoulou, “Events and Performance in the Australian Commonwealth; Their Role and Contribution: From Tanderrum and Pageant
of Ancient Nations to Australia Day and Greek Independence Day”
This paper presentation aims to focus attention on the cultural pathways of the peoples of the Australian Commonwealth peoples through the idiosyncratic confluence of imaginative events and archetypal rituals. In a parade of history, Aboriginal Tanderrum, Pageants of Ancient Nations and the performance of national commemorative celebrations highlight the expression of collective identity, consolidate unity and highlight state sovereignty. The metropolitan setting acts as a theatrical setting for the celebration of national anniversaries, such as the commemoration of the attack on Arthur Phillip’s fleet in Sydney Harbor on Australia Day, the celebrations of the Greeks on Hellenic Independence Day, but also at the International, or the Greek Ball. Set against the backdrop of the Australian landscape, the people’s reflective nostalgia presents a variety of cultural events, sealing victories, political agreements or treaties. The Treaty of Batman in 1835 between Aboriginal and Australian people was concluded in a ceremonial act, while at the end of the First World War, 2000 artists presented in Sydney the rise of British culture in Australia. In the 1930s, the League of Nations organized cultural events by groups representing the peoples of the earth to create a new liberal world in the southern hemisphere. Since 1926, Greek expatriates have been allowed to present their culture at international events. With ancient actions they win prizes and distinctions in competitions, uniquely capturing their image on the photographic or cinematographic lens, as evidenced by the surviving archives. A relationship of mutual respect is cultivated between the nations that make up the Australian Commonwealth, and the vast continent unites its bonds by showcasing the diversity of its peoples who rewrite their history through theatre and performance.
17.00 – 17.15 Preema Nazia Andaleeb, “Provoking Unknown Territory Through Performance Body”
This presentation is a reflection of my performance practice in public. I prefer to perform in a public place because it has a challenging atmosphere of democratic and convention. I seek to address the inherent interdisciplinarity of public, site-situated performance practices. Space in a work of art refers to a feeling of depth or three dimensions. There is always an intersection between people, space and the third object. I am interested in the intersections between performance acts, performing bodies, public and semi-public environments, mediated environments, cultural politics and landscapes. I am interested in public space as a civil sphere where civil society can come together and not only that sometimes they can present dissensual moments and reveal harsh antagonisms. The performance can immediately draw a large and not exclusively sympathetic crowd, ending up in a loud argument between the viewers and the participants. Performance can also have a transformative effect, and it can be used to tell a story, add life to a space, or create a focal point in space. In Bangladesh, the female body is taboo and performing in public spaces for the last twenty-four years has allowed me to break that taboo in a certain way. Now people are more aware of performance art and using public space for art has become a little more accepted than before. It creates curiosity among the masses and generates a notion of tolerance toward the female body in a public space. I also feel that the intervention of public space is also helping the community to navigate unknown territories.
Tenth Session
17.45 – 19.00 Institutional Frameworks and Public Space Practices
17.45 – 18.00 Μichail Μarmarinos – Εrato Κoutsoudaki, “Mystery 12_ ELEUSIS + REVO-LUTION, a Hybrid Narrative Installation”
The narrative installation Eleusis + Revolution was hosted in the parking lot of the Old Oil Mill in Elefsina, in June 2022, as part of the 1821 bicentennial festivities of 2023 Eleusis European Capital of Culture. The installation invites us to reflect on the dialectics of History, in the bleak context of its contemporary war circumstances. The in situ art installation becomes the trace of the performance entitled Free Besieged which was staged a year ago at the same location. The verses of the poem composed by Dionysios Solomos and used in the performance are fragmentarily represented as a deployed military unit or a cemetery. They both invite and dare us to visualise ourselves among the Missolonghians two hundred years ago. The hybrid exhibition War Scene focuses on the relation between Eleusis and the Revolution of 1821. Located inside a tent symbolising the largest organised military camp of the Greeks led by Karaiskakis on the same site, the narrative places emphasis on locality, while also investigating the role of the West in the events. The installation is mainly based on the work of local historians and collectors, it features known as well as unrevealed evidence in a fragmentary manner and poses questions as to the parameters shaping the outcome of military operations historically, experimenting on sound and scale as narrative tools. Special mention needs to be made in the soundscape with the title Karaiskakit!, presented inside the “War Room”, inside the tent. It is a sound composition that combines both experiential and informational elements. A sound-designed environment is created, made of historical testimonies, mixed with sounds and melodies, to create a small autonomous project within the project, which functions as the heart of the installation.
18.00 – 18.15 Αlexandra Αntoniadou, “Performance Art and Public Space: Consensus or Conflict?”
This paper presentation will examine the potential of performance art to intervene in public space but also its inability to do so under certain circumstances. By examining three diverse works of performance, by Georgia Sagri, Evangelia Basdekis and the group Urban Void, this paper aims to analyse in what ways censorship mechanisms and conflict with the authorities, that often take place in the field of performance, affect the work of art, especially when the actions take place in a public space. What are the conditions that reinforce the function of the artwork as both an intervention and a confrontation? In which case might the artwork lose its power and fail in completing its political mission? Through the work of the above artists and the writings of Chantal Mouffe and Alain Badiou this presentation will examine whether democracy, liberalism and consent empower or weaken the work of art.
18.15 – 18.30 Sofia Grigoriadou, “Art and Contested Spaces in Athens and Skopje: A Comparative Approach”
This paper presentation takes a comparative approach to artistic and activist interventions in (or in relation to) public spaces in Athens and Skopje. These interventions took place over the past decade, during periods of intensifying protests and public actions in both cities. The interventions were a means of claiming public space, as well as negotiating what is worthy of being highlighted or even preserved and who has the right to define it. They attempted to define areas significant to the artists or responded to official demarcations and hegemonic control of public space. They underlined traces of defacement as if with a marker on paper, demarcated “free areas” with a line, or indicated facades where traces of protests were deemed worth pointing out or even preserving. These interventions cannot be seen separately from the colour of their traces. They used the fluorescent shades of underlining markers; they were censored with the “wrong” colour; they pointed out spots in the city where colour matters; they finally highlighted the significance and meaning of the “absence” of colour – or the meaning of whiteness and its connotations. The presentation, starting from the traces of the interventions under study (or the absence of traces), aims at highlighting the performativity of those interventions: sometimes they were carried out individually or in small groups, quickly and with the use of spray paint; sometimes they focused on the visibility (and therefore the duration) of the process; other times they were part of collective protests involving several bodies. The fact that these interventions took place in public spaces allowed for performative responses that were not necessarily anticipated. Finally, this presentation perceives traces as “actors”. Constantly changing, they allow for the questioning of the idea of a “static city” that functions as a “backdrop” for action. My approach, taking into account the multiple claims of public spaces, draws on the interests and research practices developed by TWIXTlab, a project between art, anthropology and everyday life.
18.30 – 18.45 Sofia Falierou, “I+WE = SPACE: When Physicality Meets the Scenography of the City”
The International Contemporary Dance Festival Dance Days Chania has been implemented since 2011 and is a platform for creation in the public space focusing on the importance of artistic partnerships and the development of social beings. A bridge for the art of dance as a performance and as a research process to meet the community. In 2018 it created the section “New Creators and Public Space” in which young and emerging artists travel to Chania and formulate ongoing projects, inextricably linked to sites of the city. At the same time, site-specific performances take place in neighbourhoods and archaeological sites as well as conferences regarding the relationship between the body and public space. The processes of these experiments constitute the tracing of a body as a unit or in relation to other bodies in the public environment as a common place. The space participates prominently in an expanded scenography, carrying its history, its multiplicity of characteristics, its ephemeral transformation, and its synchronicity, with the creator-performer. It transforms from a sign, into a shared mode of action and embodiment, challenging and inviting the “I” of the creator and the “we” of the community into a continuous, honest and open dialogue. Such a “chance encounter”, with contemporary approaches to dance, can re-invent the space to re-engage it through physicality. The development of the relationship of “I-we-space” contributes to strengthening the social character of dance and reshapes the condition of creation, making it extrovert and more meaningful. Two worlds, both familiar and strange, become more welcoming and accessible through their encounters.
Eleventh Session
19.15 – 21.00 Romeo Castellucci’s Μa in the Archaeological Site of Elefsina
19.15 – 19.30 Elena Papalexiou, “A Modern Ritual of the Real in an Ancient Place: Ma by Romeo Castellucci”
In the framework of the 2023 ELEUSIS European Capital of Culture, Romeo Castellucci presented his creation Ma, a site-specific walking performance designed especially for the archaeological site of Eleusis, a non-theatrical space with multiple and profound historical and cultural dimensions. Castellucci’s stage dramaturgy unfolded in three main locations of the Eleusinian archaeological site, the Gymnasium, the Telesterion and the Plutonion. The management of the venue and the audience was one of the major problems during the implementation of the performance, which will be examined in this paper concerning the elements of doubt and risk that determined the final execution of this project. At the same time, I will focus on the theoretical background upon which Castellucci conceived the performance and the practical strategies which shaped the work in situ. Additionally, I will discuss the difficulties, uncertainties, twists and ad hoc solutions dictated by an imposing and at the same time unwieldy space. The sanctuary of the Eleusinian Mysteries, the Land of Eleusis, a place forbidden to the uninitiated, barbarians and matricides, was the raw material for Ma’s dramaturgy. The coming of a real matricide to Eleusis places this profane act at the centre of the community, establishing a two-way communication between antiquity and today. In this paper presentation, I will explore how time, place, myth and ritual are reframed in Castellucci’s work and become carriers of a contemporary, tangible truth and an unprecedented experience for the spectator.
Day-Conference of Young Researchers
Friday 19 April
First Session
9.00 – 10.15 In Search of Gender and Otherness
9.00 – 9.15 Konstantinos Makridakis, “Queer Places and Identities”
The main objective of this paper presentation is, on the one hand, the various, often obscure, places where queer individuals act and express themselves in Greece, specifically in the city of Athens, and, on the other, queer identities and their possible description. Regarding the examination of the concept of “place” – in the context of the spaces within which queer individuals in Athens act – the article is based on the assumption that the places of queer action have long been heteronormatively defined, within which, at best, queer individuals simply became (and continue to become) tolerated, while in the worst cases, they face rejection and hostility. These places are characterized by behaviours and traits determined by various factors, ranging from official policies to individual behaviours that reject queer identity: within this range of factors, the notion of socially “correct” and “acceptable” is determined, resulting in the promotion or rejection, respectively, of certain identities. The paper also argues that in the spaces of action of queer individuals, queer identities were correspondingly formed, and the notion of queerness emerged, a process that occurred and continues to occur gradually. Over a timespan that begins as early as the 19th century and extends to the present day, queer identities evolve into a major social issue and become a topic of discussion increasingly engaging human networks, simultaneously heralding the need for much progress to be made in order for the existing exclusions and stereotypes to fundamentally change.
9.15 – 9.30 Katerina Bilali – Georgia Kokkinou, “Peel onions, it’s your job!”
The goal of this paper presentation is to discuss the performance Peel onions, it’s your job!, which was presented on 16 February 2023 at Monastiraki Square after a rehearsal that took place on 26 January 2023. The performance intends to present the image of a woman while performing a stereotypically female job, as she peels onions, which is associated with images of pain, tears, and incarceration. Interactivity with passers-by is achieved by offering two options. There is an invitation to participate in the action of peeling the onions and an invitation to participate in a process of self-expression through writing. To understand the process through which the idea of performance was born, the course of the work and its sources of inspiration have been analysed. Starting from a theoretical study in relation to the significance and interpretation of the political body featured in performances, the connection between the political body and the urban landscape as well as the connection with the feminist theories, consequently, created the framework within which the performative actions are placed. That framework had become the model for the final presentation of this performance.
9.30 – 9.45 Marianna Koukoulekidou – Angeliki Maria Ntoufa, “Lipstick Liberation”
This paper presentation analyses a feminist performance-intervention of everyday people in the urban public space, intending to criticize and awaken the city. The two performers with different starting points, at the same time, walk through the city, among the people, marking their path on the ground with red lipstick and all the symbolism that this tool/piece of make-up carries (femininity and sensuality, empowerment but also its ability to speak and communicate one’s – a woman’s – message). Immediately, the semantics of the lipstick and its imprint on the public space are deconstructed and reshaped. The red stain is the blood of women who are lost because society and public structures are indifferent to helping them effectively. No matter how hard they speak and intervene. The destination (the police station of their city/district) is common for both of them. This lipstick, which carries both the norms and expectations of society for women as well as the stereotypes and limitations of being a woman, becomes a tool of expression and individuality that “stains” the social barriers and leaves the imprint of disobedience, defiance, of self-discovery. In a grotesque version, the performers are already dead and the red colour is the bloody mark left by their bodies. The lipstick however wears off. Will they make it to the final destination? Athens, a city-canvas, but structurally and institutionally in collapse, does not guarantee them this. How do passers-by react? Will they grab the ruined lipstick/baton? Will they notice the women? If not, they remain as they are: “motionless, speechless, unsmiling”. If so, in case someone grabs the lipstick, then they have something to say. A complaint. Just like in case they do arrive at the police station eventually.
9.45 – 10.00 Vangelis Papadakis, “Embracing Otherness: A Model of Performance Art Praxis Based on the Concept of ‘Humanism’ According to Levinas”
Emmanuel Levinas argues that “When I meet a person, I hear at the same time a request and a command that addresses my responsibility: to be charged with the care of the Other […] This ‘encounter’ is related to the idea of moral consciousness […] I become myself only by approaching the Other, only when I lift the burden imposed by the suffering of others”. According to Levinas, the “moral consciousness” is the initial impulse to create an artistic performance. The artist-performer becomes an agent of social responsibility, his body acts as a “political body”, and the performing act acquires a sacred status. So how is the “encounter” with the Other set up? Who is the Other? The public? How do you “approach” this Other? In what space? Through what action? Because “performance is actions” as Richard Schechner says (Performance Studies: An Introduction). In this paper, we are interested in how the “face”, as defined by the French philosopher, is captured in the language of performance: “The face is not only an anatomical and physical part of a body, nor the sum of the eyes, nose, and mouth. It can very well be perceived in any other part of the body. It is not only identified with the visible form but is a “living presence.” Somewhere between these concepts lies the starting point of the site-specific performance, Embracing Otherness, an embrace towards the Other, a face-to-face experiential artistic encounter, capable of freeing the two “persons” under encounter from the anxiety and fear of the anonymous Other. In the end, every Other is I myself.
Second Session
10.30 – 11.45 Exploration of the Body and Trauma
10.30 – 10.45 Eleftheria Raptou, “The Sick Body, the Body in Pain: A Performative and Spatial Mechanism”
If every era tends to construct an “image” of itself, then what are the possible images of a continually transforming self, the liminal one, on the edge and diverse; characteristics that may very well apply to the physical, corporeal self who is sick, in pain, and carries a disease. What are the performative “enunciations’’ of a condition as such? The sick body, the body in pain, is indeed performative. It is a spatial condition and an active subjectivity. The body in the context of performance art, functions as a territorialization and deterritorialization machine. Underneath the performance of a body in pain, of a body that suffers from illness, lies the notion of the body as of infinite folds and expressions through space and time. If that is the case, then the situation of illness and pain may introduce an evolving architecture of bodies and their relationships, an ongoing body-space effort to flex and adapt to the contemporary colonization of disease. The body in illness, functioning under the powers of illness-health equilibrium, represents an example of continually altered habitation of the self and thus, a continuous redesign of space, individual and collective, private and public. Based on the above assumptions that power up from the philosophy of Foucault and Deleuze, as well as from the theoretical framework set for performance and performance art by Marvin Carlson, the paper wishes to highlight the performative effect of the disease and the influence it exerts on the urban space. In the presentation, examples of performance art, as re-contextualizing spatial processes, will be pinpointed and analysed, with an emphasis on their altered function within public space and especially in spaces beyond those conventionally marked as theatrical. The paper presentation aims to introduce a mapping of the performative potential of the sick or diseased, liminal body in pain, as a means of signifying and reconstructing urban space through the perspective of performance art.
10.45 – 11.00 Ioanna Alexandri, “Passport: The Memory of Trauma as a Revived Spatial Experience”
This paper presentation attempts to explore the mechanisms of emergence and activation of the memory of trauma as inscribed in the site-specific performance Passport: A Real Adventure. The performance was presented by the theatre group Mikros Notos, under the artistic direction of Chryssa Diamantopoulou, at the Hospice of Neuro-disability (Asilo Aniaton) in Kypseli, Athens, during the theatre seasons 2022-2023 and 2023-2024 for a limited number of performances. Taking illness, pain and trauma as its conceptual starting point, the performance invites the audience to a journey, in which they are encouraged to view from a distance the adventure of life and its constant interplay with the agony of death. On this journey, the viewers freely navigate the nine rooms-stations of the Hospice that have been visually arranged for the performance. In these rooms, they are confronted with multiple manifestations of the body, but also with diverse inscriptions of decay, pain, care and hope. In this way, a spatial experience is constituted within the viewers, which is invested with each viewer’s memories of trauma and culminates in a narrative of the human experience of suffering that is individual to each viewer. The place itself, after all, the Hospice, contains the historicity of Pain. It becomes, therefore, a place of activation of this experience, a performative space. The various temporalities of performance, as they emerge through the discontinuity of the walk and the fragmentary presentation of the self in the face of trauma, also form a condition of potentiality in terms of alternative views and embodiments of the experience of trauma and pain. Additional qualities of performance, such as the particular soundscapes, the tactile relationship with the space, as well as the activation of smell, contribute to the performativity of happenings and rewrite the memory of trauma in a reconstructed perception of the corporeality and vulnerability of human existence.
11.00 – 11.15 Giota Panagi, “Making the Invisible Visible: Please Mind The Gap. A Performance in Public Space for Kinetic Disabilities”
This paper presentation will focus on the performance Mind the Gap, which took place around the metropolitan railway (metro) platform, marking the wheelchair movement within the geographical space. In the present performance, the body itself is the object of spectacle, with the aim of provoking reactions, ideals, and displacements of established socio-political perceptions, being the subject and object of art capable of provoking an active and undefined reaction. By simulating the challenges of navigating a public space, the aim is, on the one hand, to highlight the obstacles faced by people with mobility problems who use a non-powered wheelchair, and on the other hand, through the use of handwritten signs, to allow the public to reflect on the importance of mobility and accessibility in our society, also touching on aspects of both the aesthetics of disability and stereotypes and prejudices on the part of society, which are a daily experience for these people. There will be a brief reference to the physical, sensory, kinaesthetic, and participatory background of the project as well as a brief analysis of the methodology used, the concerns, as well as thoughts on the “representation of reality”. We will refer to the participatory form of action that aims to activate the public space, motivating those present to observe, explore, and investigate the problematic points in their city, making them active citizens in a political and social context, and at the same time identifying passivity as a threat to public life.
11.15 – 11.30 Maria Koronellou, “My Hair and I”
The autobiographical video performance My hair and I is about the experience of a woman who redefines her female identity through a wig when she loses her hair to cancer. Hair is one of the strongest symbols of personal and collective identity. It is a powerful symbol, first, because it is physically and very personal and, second, because although it’s personal, at the same time it’s in public view rather than private. You can express yourself through hair, it acts as a communication system, as a means of protest, as an identity and as an agent of change. The performance tests the endurance of the world in the view of a woman in a cap, grooming the wig with the emerging associations. It took place on Saturday 29/12/2022 in front of a hair salon. It was filmed with two mobile phones, one fixed and one with peripheral movement. After the scene was set, I covered my hair with a cap, took the wig and placed it on the headstand, I began to comb it, to dress it as if I were an outside hairdresser in front of the normal hair salon. Others passed by, and others stood to see what was happening. One woman wanted to put a ribbon on the wig, while another, absorbed in the spectacle, crossed the road and was hit by a car. The action lasted 1 hour in total, with a 15-minute break after the woman’s accident.
Third Session
12.00 – 13.30 Μemory Sites and Landmarks
12.00 – 12.15 Manos Damaskinos, “When the Echotope ‘Meets’ Eternity: The Case of the Walking Sound Installation The City of the Sleeping (Hypnos Project, 2016)”
This walking sound installation entitled The City of the Sleeping is presented in the context of the exhibition Hypnos Project (2016) and takes place at the First Cemetery of Athens. Time passing through a cemetery feels like it stops. Memories take us to loved ones who are gone and yet one carries them within oneself through one’s existence. The space of the cemetery, the space of the deceased, is part of another larger space, that of a city. The tombstones with the art of sculpture that adorns many creations dedicated to important figures of history open an imaginary dialogue between the observer and this static perpetual gaze. The perishability of the body tries to keep itself eternal with the sculptural object placed above it. Thus, the “performance” viewer stands in front of these sculptural creations which act as other scenographic systems. The gaze of the statue, the viewer and the sound musical composition, keep the memory intact in time in this sound and kinaesthetic walk-through performance curated by Nikos Arvanitis and musically composed by Dimitris Kamarotos.
12.15 – 12.30 Eirini Αrtopoulou – Vasiliki Koutrouli, “Capturing the Myth of The Odyssey: Performative Interventions and Embodied Interpretations of the Island Topography
In Gilles Deleuze Desert Islands, the island is the primary generative topos, becoming the surviving element of raw material, the spreading root and the source of reproduction of everything. As a space of detachment and re-creation, the island makes man the creator of a series of personal and artistic (re)births. Repetition, alteration, variation: terms that attribute to the journey the genetic characteristics of the island, as captured by modernism and philosophy (Economou). Starting with the principle mentioned above, this paper presentation seeks a multi-faceted reading of the Odyssean field through the site-specific walking performance They Used to Call Me Ulysses...What’s My Name Now? which took place on 28 May 2023 on the island of Donousa. Pairing functions of the myth with site-specific practices in a public space, the dramaturg-performer Vasiliki Koutrouli mapped the mythical topography through different points/stations of the island’s geography. The primordial research issues of the stage conception were the transformation of the view of public space as a social and cultural experience and the connection between art and corporeality (Bernard). Furthermore, the dominant point of this research approach was the body as a conveyor of individual experience, a threshold of transformations (Braidotti) and a memorial archive of the past social embodied memory (Eisner). Subsequently, the performative interventions in public space, the indissoluble grafting of the ritual with the narrative element of popular conception and the incorporation of architectural tradition, were interpreted in the context of spatial rearrangement, new fermentations and dynamics. Finally, based on audiovisual material and experiential notes of the walkable road to the sites/stations of the performance event in Donoussa, the spatialization of memory through the theory of the viewer’s perception is attempted. By highlighting a fertile field and by uniting the mythical element with contemporary performative practices, the symbolic mechanisms of articulation of collective spatial memory were activated. Our analysis is complemented by the experiential re-inscription of the space as heterotopia by the spectator/active agent of the performative action and the theory of “affect” or “the heightened affective experiences” (Erin Hurley).
12.30 – 12.45 Eugenia Maragou, “Utopian and Heterotopian Universes in the Site-Specific Performances of Choreographer Konstantinos Michos”
Konstantinos Michos is a special case of a choreographer who treats dance as a tool for the development of social consciousness, connecting art with political activism. Characteristic of his performances that unfold in public spaces, is that he chooses places with historical memory, involves the professional artists with members of the local society or precarious groups, turning the performance into a political intervention that questions the norms and destabilizes the dominant narratives but also redefines the dynamics of social relations at a collective level, functioning reflexively in history and Greek cultural identity. The present presentation will deal with the site-specific performances First Residence (2003) in the Refugees of Alexandra Avenue, Interrogation (2004) in the cells of the German occupying forces in Korai Square, Without Stigma (2005) in Sotiria Hospital and the most recent Iphigenia in Aulis (2017) in the Perama ship-repair zone in terms of the topography but also the geography of the bodies. The choice of these places for the presentation of a performance, from the choreographer’s point of view, not only fulfils the scenographic function of strongly historically and politically charged spaces but additionally if seen through a Foucauldian perspective, they move in the intermediate space between heterotopia and utopia. The refugee homes as a place to be demolished, the Gestapo cells as a place of torture, the Sotiria Hospital as a Sanatorium, and the shipyard repair zone of Perama as a site of industrial accidents, through the performance, are redefined and reactivated in the imaginary of the creator and the spectators, as places of transition to a world without inequality, without violence and social racism. Thus the same spaces, through the movement of bodies, are purified and handed over to future time, not as unwritten places, but as “sacred” ones.
12.45 – 13.00 Eleni Kelesi, “Lia Meletopoulou, Contemporary Dance and in situ Performance”
The recently founded Lia Meletopoulou’s Archive of Contemporary Dance and Performance is a collection of multimedia material, covering the individual artistic work and progress of the dancer and choreographer and the activity of her dance group, Small Dance Theatre. The paper presentation will bring into focus one of the very first performances of the Small Dance Theatre from the early 80s taking place in an abandoned former industrial space in Athens, Technohoros, where Meletopoulou and her dancers came up with an innovative in situ performance called The Points (Simeia, 1982-1983). Meletopoulou and Gioulia Gazetopoulou, the scenographer and prop-maker of the performance, preserved the “landscape conditions” of the space and maintained the material as well as the aesthetics of the interior that became part of the choreography along with Gazetopoulou’s sculptures and props constructed by what was found in-space. In 1983, Lia Meletopoulou while interviewed for the newspaper Eleftheri Gnomi mentions: “What I do is quite theatrical, to be more specific, I work on the moves to express something theatrically. In this manner I express what I believe in, my problems, my concerns, my ideas”. In the following years, Meletopoulou will excel in continuing her initial goals choreographically and theatrically. She was appreciated for what she was bringing to the Greek dance and theatre stage and was receiving gratitude and enthusiasm from important individuals such as Andreas Voutsinas who compared her artistic impact on contemporary dance to that of Pina Bausch. Before returning to Greece and during the times of Small Dance Theatre she worked with dance academies and theatres globally, from India to New York’s renowned La Mama.
13.00 – 13.15 Eva Fraktopoulou, “Chiara Guidi: The Land of Earthworms, a Tragedy for Children”
On the occasion of my participation as an actress, in the seminar of the Summer Oracle organized by the Ioannina Theatre in 2019, I had the opportunity to attend an eight-day seminar under the guidance of Chiara Guidi. The Italian creator – a founding member, together with Romeo and Claudia Castellucci, of the Socìetas Raffaello Sanzio Company – tackled ancient theatre by adapting Euripides’ Alceste. The result of this research and artistic project was the staging of the performance entitled The Land of the Earthworms, a Tragedy for Children (from 7 years old) presented in the archaeological site of the ancient theatre of Dodona. The main elements of this performance were the errant method and its interactive character, as the children who attended were actively involved in the development of the plot. It should be mentioned that it had been performed outside in unconventional indoor theatre spaces, such as an old factory. The peculiarity of the project was that The Land of the Earthworms was presented at a world premiere in an outdoor venue in Greece. Based on the above dramaturgical text by Chiara Guidi, I will develop my research around site-specific performance and specifically on how a play is transported and travels to unconventional theatrical spaces and places. In addition, the highly interactive nature of site-specific performances in extended theatre spaces will be analysed about audience reception. Finally, emphasis will be placed on the educational character of such projects and their value for theatre teaching.
Fourth Session
14.30 – 16.15 Contemporary Urban Environment
14.30 – 14.45 Georgia Kakara – Konstantina Liberi, “Performance and School. Public Space, Forum Theatre and Artificial Intelligence”
In this paper presentation, the performative transformation of the school public space will be discussed through site-specific practice, in addition to the type of social relations that are presented in the daily spaces of this building and how these are entangled in the routines of these places through Forum Theatre and artificial intelligence (AI) out of the usual and conventional spaces of performing arts. Inspired by the “theatrical spectacle in a public space”, in a “forum” of Cavafy’s poem Waiting for the Barbarians, starts a creative dialogue between the performer and the audience in the context of the performance while, at the same time, exploring the various spaces of a school building, of modern architecture and northwest orientation, next to the ancient river Lilas, in Evia. For this reason, embodied unique characteristics of each space, but also everyday elements of the school environment, such as the large yard, the courts, the stairs, and the lecture hall were used as well as the library and the spacious teachers’ offices on the ground floor, as an essential part of the narrative. Meanwhile, the students’ participation in the performance encouraged creativity and collaboration among them with the goal of a dynamic and multi-layered experience. At the same time, the performer by using artificial intelligence (AI) tools and sites, improved not only the planned activities but also highlighted the flexibility and authenticity, extension and quality enrichment of the performance, creating at the same time, imaginative performance spaces implicitly connected to the real ones. Ultimately, according to the results, the adoption of innovative ways of renegotiating the public space of school created new spaces of common experience not only in the present but also in the future, conversing with the new generation through Cavafy’s poetry, artificial intelligence and mainly with performance practices.
14.45 – 15.00 Αnna Matziari, “Performance, Street, Protest and Political Activism (Αrtivism)”
With this paper presentation, an analysis of the relationship between art in public spaces and political activism, Artivism, is attempted. Picasso once said, “Art is not for decoration, but a weapon for battle”. Engaged art, can be a driving force for social change, not aiming solely for aesthetic results; primarily, it targets protest, addressing a broader crisis of ideas and values rather than a specific enemy. The term artivism denotes a collective tendency to react to injustice through creative expression, serving as a means of resistance that allows for a multidimensional awareness. The use of creative expression for raising social awareness extends across various fields, such as visual arts, poetry, music, cinema, and theatre. Artists employ parody or “culture jamming” resisting the dominant ideology of consumerism and seeking to create an alternative culture aiming to transform society. There is a wide range of examples from Picasso to Marina Abramović, Ai Weiwei, and Augusto Boal, to graffiti on the buildings of North Belfast declaring “prepared for peace, ready for war”, to Banksy’s works reaching astronomical prices in the art market, and to the Pussy Riots wearing hoods and colourful clothing, urinating on Putin’s photograph. Artistic expression, humorous and ironic, oscillates between a fierce desire for resistance and victory and the joy of life taking inspiration from the harsh repression of our daily lives. “With the events we narrate, we seek to achieve the complete transformation of our audience”, declared the Guerrilla Girls. Björk collaborated with Rosalía, singing a duet on “Oral” about the overfishing of salmon, and in “This Land Is Your Land”, Woody Guthrie sang about the wild beauty of America: “Was a high wall there that tried to stop me / A sign was painted said: Private Property”.
15.00 – 15.15 Ero Tzitroudi-Gaitanidi, “Borders Between Public and Private Space: Site- Specific Performances in Contemporary Athens”
This paper presentation addresses performances of new artists and their site-specific projects in open public spaces in diverse contexts, i.e. the interpretation of the concept of private ownership of public spaces, public spaces bearing characteristics of private interests and purely public spaces. The artistic project Supersport will be presented in support of the first case; Supersport is a collective of artists who have transformed the abandoned for forty years industrial area of Chropei in Faliro, into an experiential, dadaistic environment by reusing the leftover materials of the chemical factory (October 2023). Regarding the second case, we will discuss the artistic exhibition curated by Dimitris Trikas, titled Chthonic and Anthropocene that took place in Eleonas (September-November 2023). More specifically, the performance The Acropolis Left Our Plate, which was conducted in the context of this exhibition, by the artistic duo Comasi achieved a combination of sociological research and activist action. Implemented by the residents of the sidewalk of Markoni Street themselves, who narrated the serious psychological injuries they experienced due to the environmental damage of their neighbourhood by the Greek State: the Municipality of Athens placed old asphalt materials, creating a pile of waste that resulted in the environmental destruction of the area and a health hazard to the residents. Regarding the third category, we will discuss the performances by the groups Sancho Pancha and Blip, along with the project Pugnant Films. The feminist collective Sancho Pancha created an activist performance at the statue of King Constantine in Pedion Tou Areos and transformed it into Don Quixote, implementing a sharp intervention in the public space. In addition, the Blip group, along with the Pugnant Films project, conducted a sound performance at the quarries of Korydallos (July 2023). Several of the above projects faced repression and intimidation from state agencies that were disturbed by the artists’ presence in public spaces.
15.15 – 15.30 Maria-Sarra Karpouzi, “It Matters Because I Gave it Meaning: A Personal Mapping of the City”
In the fast pace of the urban fabric and daily life in the capital, there are some moments when some external, or even internal factors, pause your step for a few minutes and give another meaning to your existence in the public space. The space turns from public to private, what happens to you at that moment does not happen to the person next to you. That space no longer holds the same importance it had before. Little by little, you collect various points-landmarks of personal significance in the city, creating your map. Is there a way and/or reason to share this? The action It Matters Because I Gave it Meaning was created as a way to rebrand the city and claim my right to exist in it as a distinct individual. This can be viewed as a large work-in-progress that could grow and continue as long as I live in this city. The action was based on the creation and mapping of a route through the urban fabric of Athens, capturing points of personal significance. During a long journey through the centre of Athens, I left behind personal objects suggesting that these particular places meant something special to me, something that could make an impression on someone else or give rise to similar thoughts. Alternatively, one could even pass the objects by without paying any attention to them. In this way, if only for a few minutes, a public space acquired elements of my own identity: an offering to the city that hosts us. In my presentation, I intend to refer to similar actions in which experiential participation in public space, rewriting personal memory and communication with everyday life played a central role. Furthermore, based on my own experience, I wish to analyse the rationale, outcome and reflections of these actions.
15.30 – 15.45 Christina Thanasoula, “Open Light: A Performative Experiment in Public Space”
In 2020, the pandemic led to the closure of theatres for fourteen months. Theatre practitioners responded immediately to the new reality by proposing alternative ways and places of viewing, both digital and non-digital. The public space suddenly found itself in the centre of the performing arts, as, for a long time, it emerged as the only alternative performance space. Open Light, by Youla Boudali and Christina Thanasoula, was a product of this dystopian circumstance, creating an occasion for meeting in an open-air public space, on the sidewalk of Deinokratous street in Kolonaki, outside Prosorinos performance space. Open light, consisting of 16 independent mosaics –pieces of performance material– juggling at the crossroads of lighting installation and site-specific performance, was not a performance, nor was it developed as one: both the creative process and the end result were experimental. The glass facade of the Prosorinos space was used as a stage, in which a dynamic “shopping window” was created; light, sound and words composed an uncanny stage event, crossfading one into the other. The spectators were the passers-by on the street, who could, freely, sit on the pavement, visit the kiosk across the street, leave and return. In this experimental context, vision was at the heart of performativity; light acted as a driving force and a lever of emotion, capturing the gaze of the passers-by – spectators, focusing their attention on the living showcase. Light played a structural role in creating unfamiliar stage dreamscapes for the numbed – by extensive screen use – retinas (Aronson, 2005) of the passers-by – viewers, in a purposeful attempt to redefine the identity of the medium, its stage role and specific weight, suggesting a new process and application for stage lighting. This paper presentation aims to “shed light” on the process and discuss its findings.
15.45–16.00 Magdalini Ntourou, “Hey, You!: Attempts at Appropriation of Public Space and Cultural Memory”
This paper presentation addresses a theoretical framework for the audio-visual installation Hey, You!, where the audience is invited to watch a built-in video projection through a hole in the wall while listening to an accompanying voice-over through headphones. The installation forms part of a work in progress exploring performative possibilities in the urban life of the centre of Athens. The video-projection includes documentation of performances that took place in front of the Propylaia building on Panepistimiou Street. Both the performances and their redefinition within the frame of the installation deal with the hegemonic gaze of the surveillance camera (Foucault) and its control over citizens, thematizing a constitutive concept of cinematic narrative – the point of view – and drawing inspiration from Jim Morisson’s poetic text Notes on Vision and Samuel Beckett’s Film. The omnipresent gaze of the camera “interpellates” (Althusser) the monitored subjects and protects them while rendering them passive, making them exchange political responsibility for consent and exercising a form of invisible violence in the public space. The subjects’ need for visibility – their need to be perceived and therefore to exist (“esse est percipi”, Bishop Berkeley) – complements this gaze ascribing existential and self-referential dimensions to it, thus relating to Martin Buber’s notion of the need for the other and Sartre’s concept of the look. The viewpoint of the apotropaic, sphynx-like acroteria and statues on the roof of the historic Propylaea building – functioning as a metaphor for the surveillance camera – and the disembodied voice-over is an attempt to reveal the state of exception or the zone of indistinction between identity and anonymity imposed on the body politic. The installation aims to engage the audience in a process of rewriting personal memory in public space, in an appropriation of cultural memory and a reflective critique of media and the construction mechanisms of memory and subjectivity.
16.30 – 17.00 Live Performance
Peter Baren, Can’t Stop The Volume! Peace Will Come To Me!
The performance work searches for a common ground between sensual bewilderment and operational suffering, challenging the constructed nature of our ideas on progress and memory, derived from our social, and cultural circumstances and territories. Here follows a description of the live performance: The outlook is of a protester, well-dressed. My durational walk consists of holding up two different text signs “CAN’T STOP THE VOLUME!!” and “PEACE WILL COME TO ME!!” by walking through the university premises, corridors and venues where the activities take place. Eventually, bringing the performance to an end, I will tear the text signs apart in a quiet fashion. Τhe the performance will be centered around the Museum with the cast displays of the ancient statues in the School of Philosophy.
18.00 – 19.45 Live Performances
18.00 – 18.15 Dimitris Chatzitheodosiou, dAirect Democracy Demo [3DAi]
In recent years, western polyarchies (Heywood 2006) have shown their age and produce more and more dissatisfied citizens who either are indifferent to the state phenomenon as they are not essentially represented or accumulate dangerous anger in the bowels of society as a result of injustice, inequality, and uneven distribution of wealth, rights, and positions. As we move towards a “Brave New World” (Huxley 1958) where our fibre-optically interconnected world (Christakis and Fowler 2009) will be disrupted by modern science through the discoveries and evolutions of artificial intelligence (AI) and robotics, which will soon radically and once and for all, change the social and economic organization of societies, the state aspect could not remain unaffected. These technologies, even at their current stage of development, make possible the application of new versions of direct democracy (inspired by ancient Greece and Switzerland’s referendums) that bring back governance and responsibility into the hands of all citizens. Utilizing performativity (Carlson, 2014; Auslander 2008; Schechner 2013), the performance 3-DAi does what its name suggests: it returns legislative and judicial power to the hands of the broad majority, assisted by all of humanity’s knowledge through Large Language Models AI, and more specifically a fine-tuned Generative Pre-trained Model (GPT) named “SOLOMON II”. The conference room is temporarily transformed into a “parliament-theatre” brought from the near future, where the audience forms a legal body (by simulating a parliament) and actively participates in this performance, as active citizens of the future, legislating and judging on a specific state issue, in minimum time, experiencing for the first time the power of the performative speech (Austin 1975) as law. The performance is part of a broader production, developed within the framework of the performative and activist activity of the Cultural Association of Theatre and Art Deuskouros Phoenix for the claim of democratizing AI technologies.
18.30 – 18.45 Stella Maggana – Aphrodite Mitsopoulou – Angeliki Strataki, HOPA!2
In the winter of 2023, within the framework of the Postgraduate Programme at the Department of Theatre Studies of the University of Athens NKUA, specifically in the course “History and Theory of Performance” taught by Ass. Professor Maria Konomi, actors Stella Maggana, Aphrodite Mitsopoulou, and Angeliki Strataki created the performance HOPA! The performance took place at Exarchia Square and was conceived as a site-specific project. The concept originated from the enclosed and fenced-off area of the historic square due to ongoing metro railway construction, monitored 24/7 by the Hellenic Police, intervening and affecting the daily lives of residents. According to the group’s perspective, this situation is a political issue: on one hand, it seeks to dismantle the historical significance of the neighbourhood by interfering with its primary cultural and political memory, while also eliminating one of the few communal, and in particular, green spaces. The main objective of the performance was, to utilise the rabbit’s form and construct a postmodern parody universe, to engage in a dialogue with the city itself. This dialogue aimed to address dehistoricization, the systematic governmental effort to abolish social meeting spaces, the neutralization of collective memory, and the displacement of the vulnerable from their homes due to the onslaught of Airbnb. With the opportunity presented by this conference, we aim to explore the codes of the performance lecture to present the sequel, HOPA!2. Our goal is to delve into the HOPA! experience, experimenting with the spatial dynamics of the amphitheatre environment. Through the use of video, soundscapes and focused actions, we intend to interact with the audience and ultimately question issues related to the infringement of public spaces and, more broadly, tactics that exacerbate social isolation and the marginalization of the Other.
19.00 – 19.15 Anastasia Dailiani, EXORIA
The performance EXORIA attempts a commentary in the context of the intended privatisation of higher education and, by extension, the privatisation of public universities. It starts from the intense concern regarding the intended connection of the acquisition of knowledge at the level of higher education predominantly with economic criteria in the sense of guided utilitarianism and the consequent removal/alteration/downgrading of components of the identity of the student and the transformation of education from a collective right to an individual choice. The theme will be approached through a site-sensitive performance, in the sense that it will concern and “engage” with the building complex of the School of Philosophy, everything it symbolizes and signifies, but also everything that is conceptually and essentially under its umbrella. As former custodians of free, accessible and gratis knowledge, these spaces now constitute a controversial-hollow space, or else a guarded space-enterprise which will open the gates selectively on exclusively economic terms and terms of instrumentalization of knowledge. In the context of the performance, the building, stripped of its essence, is transformed into a museum building. An inhospitable place, alienated, crowded and at the same time empty. Does it have something to say? The performer’s penetrating gaze and “groping” will attempt to re-appropriate the “lost” public space. The performance will perform a “memorial” to the lost innocence of knowledge and higher education ensured by its public nature while attempting a commentary on the loss of university asylum and freedom. The tools of the performance will be the performers themselves and the signification of their presence through the attempted commentary and their physical interaction with the space (the surrounding space of the faculty of philosophy). The use of discourse/abstract use of texts that are indirectly or directly related to the theme of the performance is not excluded. Conception – Creation – Execution: Natasha Dailiani. Participating performer: Dimitriοs Chatzitheodosiou.
19.30 – 19.45 Μari-Souzan Mouzela, Body Rhizome-Not Hierarchical
The theatre-philosophical site-specific performance Body Root-Not Hierarchical in public space, for one performer and two actors, is based on the theatre play Crave by Sarah Kane and the philosophical considerations of the philosophers Gilles Deleuze, Felix Guattari, Rosi Braidotti, as well as the theatre-philosophy lectures of the Professor of Philosophy, Theory of Theatre and Drama Giorgos Pefanis, regarding the becoming-subject which is constituted through continuous displacements between different levels of power and desire drawing lines of escape from the dominant socio-political hierarchical structures and the authoritarian mechanisms of totalization and homogeneity. The performance in question uses the following philosophical concepts: “rhizomatic”, “difference”, “becoming” and “body without organs”, “multiplicity”, and interacts with both selected excerpts from the play Crave as well as the philosophical considerations of the aforementioned philosophers in a common conceptual framework, in the view of consideration on the appropriation of the desiring flow process of the non-hierarchical body, decentralized in a web of rhizomatic connections without fixed identities, open to multiplicity through “difference”, away from the narrow framework of figurative thinking, from the identity and hierarchical taxonomic logic, whether it is life, or death, or the other. During the site-specific live performance, the screen-based performance of the same title filmed in a different public space will be shown simultaneously on the screen, which will interact with each other in a common conceptual-theatrical-philosophical context. With the use of technology, a contemporary live and pre-recorded theatrical-philosophical-musical soundscape will be formed and integrated into an expanded scenography in the public space forming a multiple idiosyncratic heterotopia and a new synthesis performance of the fragmented non-hierarchical body to transform the public space, the body of the performer, the actors and the spectators. The expanded scenography in the public space and the philosophical concepts are dramaturgical tools of site-specific live and screen-based performance with the main aim of exploring the boundaries between theatre, philosophy and performance.
Site-Specific Workshops and Live Performances
Saturday 20 April
Central Athens
6.30 – 7.00 Paul Regan, Dispensation [St. Paul, Athína], site-specific performance (location: Areopagus Hill, plate with Apostle Paul's sermon)
A site-specific solo performance by Paul Regan [IRL] at sunrise at The Areopagus. The work is the second iteration of a study on hagiography, personas, identity and belonging. The figure of Saint Paul the Apostle is teleported as a contemporary persona meandering through sites of cultural (mis)appropriation and belonging. The performer/activist finds objects and meaning through ritual and dedication to the cause. In this instance, the performer references the recent censorship in New York of the Greek artist Georgia Lale by the Greek government authorities for her work on femicide. How does one identify in relation to artistic censorship? What is a performative response? What are the functions of cultural historical sites and how does their history relate to contemporary artistic intervention? How do we respond to other artist’s work in the field of activism and image-making?
8.00 – 10.00 Grapefruits in the City, promenade performance (location: National Garden)
The promenade performance Grapefruits or the Seasons in the City was presented as part of the student participation of the Department of Theatre Studies NKUA at the international exhibition Prague Quadrennial PQ23. The performance drew inspiration from sources such as the critical essay of Cornelius Kastoriadis, The Imaginary Institution of Society, the naive persona “Marcovaldo” (Italo Calvino) and Fluxus artist’s workbook Grapefruit (Yoko Ono). The artistic project Grapefruits or the Seasons in the City prequalifies a site-specific performance by an ensemble of artists/viewers in the public urban landscape of Athens, as happened last June in Prague, specifically in the Holešovice market and the Vltava river. Fluxus means flow, movement, and change. As new allegorical Marcovaldos, the performers focus on activating the urban landscape and the modern person’s relationship with nature, exploring the landscape and developing performance scores. The goal is the development of mental and symbolic spaces in an attempt at a poetic dialogue with everyday life dealing with urban limits. The project will be carried out by a group of graduate and undergraduate students under the supervision and guidance of Dimitra Nikolopoulou, performance-based facilitator and PhD candidate of the Department of Theatre Studies NKUA. The performance Grapefruits or the Seasons in the City in Prague was implemented with the financial support of the European Union and the programme Creative Europe/Culture Moves Europe.
10.00 – 13.00 Μary Zygouri, “Performative Fragments and Traces in Public Space”, workshop (location: Klathmonos Square)
The site-specific performance seminar will take place at the Dragatsaniou Street Gallery in Klathmonos Square in central Athens. In the basement of the gallery are the fragmentary parts of the Themistocles’ Wall of ancient Athens Surrounded by the abandoned and dilapidated shops of the 60s commercial gallery. The archaeological site, although open to the public, remains unseen and rarely visited. In and out of the bustling cityscape of the centre, ancient and modern ruins seem frozen in time. At the same time, however, they excite the imagination and echo forgotten “forms of collective life”. The participants of the seminar, with their bodies and what they carry (props, ready-mades) as their main material, are invited to explore sensorially the multiple temporalities of the site. To feel the textures of the wall, to listen to the voices of the past. To let themselves be absorbed by the fascination of the decay and decadence of the place to retrieve and ultimately visualize memories of the place and the participants. Deep down, this place creates a sense of a nest, a shelter that can accommodate potential “realities” where anything is possible. The seminar aims to lead participants to alternative ways of being and relating to others. A common meeting place, but also a means of liberation and revelation.
13.00 – 14.00 Preema Νazia Andaleeb, The Third Eye (তৃতীয় নেত্র), live performance (location: Ermou Street)
The third eye is an invisible eye, usually depicted as located on the forehead, which provides perception beyond ordinary sight. In Hinduism, the third eye refers to the ajna chakra. In both Hinduism and Buddhism, the third eye is said to be located around the middle of the forehead, slightly above the junction of the eyebrows, representing the enlightenment one achieves through meditation. In the performance, I will be on a high-rise podium in front of the audience covered up with white or black sheets. I will start moving inside the cover. And will take my hands out and repetitively do actions with my hands, creating “mudra”, creating symbols of my culture with my hand gestures. I will combine cultural symbols and incorporate the gestures of religion. Each of the symbols signifies a different meaning of spirit that will open up the inner senses. I will perform for fifteen minutes. At this point, I will come out from the cover and will start walking through the area and draw third eyes on the chosen (audience) forehead. I will do it for a few (previously) selected people or random people. Then I will slowly blindfold the chosen ten people from the audience and one after one bring them in front of the blank surface. There will be ten blank white papers. At this point, I blindfold myself and together we draw an eye on each of the blank papers one by one. When finish drawing I will unfold and bring the drawings on the ground. Each of the participants will sit in front of the drawing and I will touch the ground with my forehead in a repetitive manner from the opposite direction. I collect all the drawings and distribute them among the audience to search/seek of third eye a continuous process. That’s the end of the performance. Later on, we need to collect all the drawings from the audience and keep them as a document of performance and we shall take photos of the people whom I chose to draw eyes on their forehead
15.00 – 18.00 Ioanna Remediaki, “Τhe Body of the City”, workshop (location: Kerameikos area)
This acting workshop engages participants in the public space and the collective body/word. It started by working in open public spaces of Athens, parks, streets, squares, markets, museums, and archaeological sites, continued in Italy and then in Ierapetra, looking for parts of the city’s body, parts of our body. As initial texts, we will look at advertisements/proverbs from ancient Greek tragedy, which we will combine with everyday stories we encounter in the city, and with our personal stories.
17.00 – 20.00 Anna Tzakou – Μarios Chatziprokopiou, “Body, Urban Space and Poetics”,
walking performance workshop (starting from Kaplanon & Massalias Street towards Strefi Hill)
Tracing the course of the walking performance Rea Frantzi [exit] (Geopoetics group, 2021) in Neapolis, Exarchia, Anna Tzakou and Marios Chatziprokopiou organize a workshop of site-specific walking performance and poetics in the centre of Athens. Through practices of mindfulness, kinetic improvisation (contemplative dance practice), mnemotechnics (Yates, Giannisi) and psychogeography (Debord, Wrights and Sites), the workshop performs a journey of human geography connecting individual experience with collective narratives, as reflected in the mnemonic traces of the city. The workshop enlists human action, activity and presence in the urban landscape as a means of artistic research based on the following questions: How is the public place performed? What kind of traces does it leave (to the space and/or the participants)? How does the site-specific poetic event affect the individual’s relationship with the city and what narratives does it create? In the first stage, participants are invited to explore the urban landscape based on performative and poetic tools proposed to them. We reconnect with shape, texture, movement, materiality, sound, perspective, transition, the other, the more-than-human other, the palimpsest scripts of the city, and redefine the place through small events, sensual (self-) biographies and/or topologies of “togetherness”. In a second stage, based on the embodied experience of the city, participants are invited to compose a score of performance/meeting with the urban landscape: (a chor (e) ography, a game, a collective textual route etc.), a small topographical structure, or a “songline” (Chatwin) in the centre of Athens.
18.00 – 20.00 Evangelia Basdekis, “Misspelled Poetry”, workshop (location: Iera Odos)
We will wonder if the acts of daydreaming and wandering can introduce the trait of deceleration in the public space – being a counter-proposal to reality’s conditions – undermining thereby its normalcy by creating a “heterotopia” and an actual rift in our foregone relationship with it? How is our encounter, our relationship with the public space transformed via the elements of transcendence, seduction, and slowdown which the act of the phenomenon creates? I believe by introducing the element of deceleration into an urban (or rural) environment, and against the “imperative speed” of capitalism and the one-sided dimension defined by class consciousness, the daydream turns into an act of political challenge. The dialectical mediation raises various questions and at the same time, it creates gaps in the stereotypical interpretation of the public space. It succeeds thus, an alternative dimension in the ways the public space is regularly conceived. Different kinds of relationships and correlations between the citizen and the space, in which he operates, are revealed in a radically new perspective. This condition creates an “unprotected” interplay between the observer and public space, open to multiple interpretations. This new form of dialogue created by daydreaming is defining the circumstances for the “invention” and experience of a different kind of objectivity – albeit occasionally.
Summary Programme of Masterclasses and Workshops
Room of the Library of the School of Philosophy NKUA
Wednesday 17 Αpril
13.00 – 15.00 Vitoria Κotsalou, “Disorientating Ground”, workshop
Moving from the introduction of concepts of social choreography to simple practices of dance and navigation in public space, we will explore how the observation of the public can open up new possibilities for forming relationships and conversely how embodied exploration and identification with “public” can offer a different kind of perspective of values, information and sense of the world. The workshop focuses on the concept of navigation and un-mapping and how movements (whether we talk about the movement of our senses, oxygen, thoughts or muscles) are influenced by our experiences. At the same time, our experiences influence our pre-sensory habits and ultimately how we perceive and relate to the world. Dance is introduced as a means of being, contact and thinking, and the body as an intermediate landscape, connected to a complex and rich system of different organisms. How can public space or body function as a ritual ground for the reawakening of lost creative senses, for the aberration of how we are used to perceive and connect? How do we become in-betweens? How can we notice the way we connect and how we follow navigation within our bodies and how does our internal mapping translate and decode the way we navigate the public, or the social? Conversely, how can expanded realities of the public or social web affect the way we navigate our thinking, and what is of value, or even our relationship to our sense of bodies?
15.00 – 17.00 Yolanda Μarkopoulou, “Biography of a Place”, workshop
Using a particular location as our focal point, alongside its history and the individuals intertwined with it, we will explore how we might unveil an aspect of it that remains unknown to the general public. We’ll embark on a journey involving meticulous documentation, thorough research, and the exchange of various practical methodologies setting as our goal the creation of a documentary site-specific performance.
Thursday 18 Αpril
11.00 – 13.00 Εliza Soroga, “Site-Specific Performance Workshop: Art and Everyday Life Have Nothing but Blurred Boundaries”, workshop
How do we create a site-specific performance? How do we incorporate the poetics of an existing place into the compositional process? The aim of this workshop is for participants to gain a first insight into the site-specific approach in which space constitutes the prima materia of the work. The work’s concept derives from an interactive dialogue with the site, allowing it to form its content, research and evolution. This workshop will focus on enhancing spatial awareness, introducing the concepts of time, scale, trust, touch, spatial memory and active hearing as ways to introduce participants to site-specific performance’s creative method. The architectural elements of a space (doors, windows, walls, columns), the everyday use of space, its history, location, diffusion of light and the choreography of everyday life are some of the elements that make up the canvas of observation. Let’s create a rare encounter with passers-by. Let’s translate our thoughts and ideas into direct experience in a raw artistic reality, where art and everyday life will have nothing but blurred boundaries. Referencing “expanding theatre” , the site-specific performance builds upon the idea that the whole world can be seen as a stage – Theatrum Mundi – and the passers-by as performers in their everyday life, an idea that was developed following the tradition of the “theatrum mundi” and Balzac’s work La Comédie Humaine. The workshop will take place at the School of Philosophy NKUA in areas inside and outside the main building. It is addressed to everyone, regardless of previous studies, experience and age.
16.00 – 19.00 Danae Theodoridou, “Exploring the Performativity of the Public Body”, masterclass
Political philosophers and analysts stress that today we experience a democracy without “demos”. This lack is manifested in the indifference of citizens to politics, the high level of abstention from electoral processes, and the constant transfer of power from elected bodies to depoliticized technocrats. At the same time, Mouffe discusses the critical contribution of art to the effort to reactivate the demos. Through the embodied connections of artistic and social structures proposed by art, Mouffe notes, public forms of collective bodies are created that disrupt the “normal” rhythm of cities. Continuing the same line of thought, political scientist Pierre Ostiguy stresses the close relationship between democracy and performativity (2017). In addition to what is said, what is also crucial in democratic processes, he argues, is how it is said, as well as issues of physical and emotional proximity as expressed through language, accent, sound, body language, gestures, etc. Supporting the central role of performativity in politics and democracy, performing arts theorists, such as Ana Vujanovic and Livia Andrea Piazza (2019), also stress that artistic structures can play an important role in activating the demos by constructing a space that invites people to engage in alternative ways of thinking and acting. By reconnecting, even if only in an imaginative context, the practice of democracy with the materiality of the body, by approaching political practices through the senses and the collective social imaginary, the performing arts create micro-communities able to open up space for new modes of social coexistence, different from the dominant capitalist ones, and of (re)constructing public space in a way that is otherwise not possible. When this happens, art manages to constitute an act of “publicing” (Theodoridou 2022). Drawing on materials from my five-year-long artistic research on the “practice of democracy”, the workshop will seek to construct such an act of “publicing” through performative processes of thinking, speaking and moving.
Friday 19 Αpril
9.30 – 11.30 Giannis Varvaresos, “Public Space as a Theatre Stage”, workshop
“All the world’s a stage” (As You Like It, William Shakespeare)
Erving Goffman in The Presentation of Self in Everyday Life (1956) introduces the use of the dramaturgy model in social life. In this model, the interpretation and understanding of reality is done through theatre. The writer invites us to imagine the world as a stage and the people, enacting the nature of actors, capable of representing diverse roles before diverse crowds of spectators. People, thus, are viewed as acting as separate entities or in cooperation with each other that differ according to the contexts of stage action and the specific situations. Life is not and cannot be a theatre, however several of the concepts proposed in the dramaturgy model deserve to be a field of research and experimentation. In the experimental workshop that I propose, we will not imagine that life is a theatre, but that the public space is a theatre stage. This scene contains all the spaces of the theatrical architecture: the stage of the performance, proscenium and backstage, and people who interact with each other, as actors do. In a theatrical act, the other designers and performers manage, usually with the help of the director, to combine various materials, so that people, situations, concepts, and conflicts can be highlighted. Depending on what story they want to tell and why they want to say it, these materials take place in space and time. Using some of the elements that characterize the theatrical practice, such as the body, speech, set design, costumes, lighting and music, we will try to become directors, performers and audience. The goal is to highlight elements and situations of the public space and the socio-political context that surrounds it so that each of us can express a performative public speech.
12.30 – 14.30 Vangelis Papadakis, “Setting up an in situ Performance in Public Space”, workshop
Richard Schehner in his book Performance Studies. An Introduction, attempts to define performance as “an action that is framed, presented, highlighted or displayed”. The morphology of performance art consists of four elements. The development of the performance in the context of physical space, its development within specific time frames, the physical presence of the artist in this space, and the development of the particular relationship between the artist and the audience. How could a performance be practically set up based on the above? What defines its starting point? What is the initial impulse that activates the artist-performer? What are his tools? How are the qualities of space “dramatically” exploited to most appropriately convey the message of the performance? How are the time and the audience addresses defined? His body? “Each body is political”, according to Lacan. The body, an ultimate exponent of everything, becomes the field where norm and exception, the acceptable and the unacceptable, conservatism and freedom collide. The political body acts towards awakening the public to whom it addresses. It needs to cause a shock effect. To shift it, even for a moment, so that it moves outside its regulatory framework. Based on the above concerns, each participant in the workshop will set up a short and spontaneous in situ performance during the seminar.
Saturday 20 April
Central Athens
10.00 – 13.00 Μary Zygouri, “Performative Fragments and Traces in Public Space”, workshop (location: Klathmonos Square)
15.00 – 18.00 Ioanna Remediaki, “Τhe Body of the City”, workshop (location: Kerameikos area)
17.00 – 20.00 Anna Tzakou – Μarios Chatziprokopiou, “Body, Urban space and Poetics”, walking performance workshop (starting from Kaplanon & Massalias Street towards Strefi Hill)
18.00 – 20.00 Evangelia Basdekis, “Misspelled Poetry”, workshop (location: Iera Odos)
