Διευρυμένη σκηνογραφία, περφόρμανς και δημόσιος χώρος / Expanded Scenography, Performance and Public Space

CONFERENCE PRESENTERS & YOUNG RESEARCHERS’ CVs

CONFERENCE PRESENTERS’ CVs

 

IOLI ANDREADI

Theatre Director/ Playwright / Researcher, Laboratory of Molecular Neurobiology and Neurophysiology NKUA

 

She studied at the Department of Theatre Studies (NKUA) and the Drama School of Theatro Technis and continued her postgraduate studies in Cultural Management at Panteion University and in Theatre Direction at RADA. She completed her PhD in Performance, Theatre and Ritual (Performance Research Group, King's College London). A Fulbright Foundation Grant enabled her to research tragedy and musicals in New York, while fellowships from Stavros Niarchos Foundation supported her artistic work in the USA (2009-2013). The combination of writing, directing and teaching in her performances formed the basis of her professional work in Greece and abroad (2003-2024), accompanied by the publication of twelve theatre plays by Kapa Ekdotiki. She works in higher education (AUTH).  Her monograph Theatre and Education, Theory and Practice, published by Kapa Ekdotiki (Athens 2023), reflects her interest in the importance of theatre in pre-school and school education. Artaud's thinking on theatre, the human brain and education is implicated in her postdoctoral research at King's College London (2015-2016) and at the Laboratory of Cellular Neurobiology-Neurophysiology of the University of Athens (2018-present). The monograph Performance Practice, Direction - Philosophy - Culture is published by Kapa Ekdotiki.

 

               ALEXANDRA ANTONIADOU

                            Art Historian (PhD) / Lecturer HOU       

 

She lectures on Greek art and architecture at Hellenic Open University. She has studied archaeology and art history (AUTH) and continued her studies in history and theory of modern art at the University of Essex (UK). She completed her PhD in performance art in Greece at the University of Edinburgh. She has also completed her postdoctoral research Performance Art and Feminism in Contemporary Greek Art: Social Reproduction, Labour and Affect at the Department of Applied and Fine Arts (UOWM), funded by the State Scholarship Foundation. Her research concerns performative and participatory practices in contemporary art with an emphasis on performance art in Greece. Her academic interests focus on feminist methodologies and the connection between art and public space, biopolitics, contemporary democracy and fascism. She has taught art history and theory in Thessaloniki and Edinburgh. She has participated in international conferences and has published research papers on performance art in Greek and English.

 

PATRICIA APERGI

Choreographer / Artistic Director Aerites Dance Company

 

Born in Athens, she founded the Aerites Dance Company (2006). For the company she has choreographed: The House of Trouble (2023), U(R)TOPIAS (2021), Hero (2020), Polittes (Citizens Defeated) (2018), Cementary (2017), TANZheimer (2014), Planites (2013), Era poVera (2012), The Manifest of the Other (2010), d.opa! (dopamines of post-Athenians) (2009), Ferry Tales (2009), Apolost (2008) and Anorexia Socialis (2007). The company has toured various dance festivals and venues around the world. She has choreographed theatre plays, operas and art installations in collaboration with various artists and has been invited internationally as guest choreographer. She is the co-writer of the book History of Theatre and Theatrical Education (2007). She was selected as modul-dance artist of the European network EDΝ for the period 2013–2014, and as an associate artist at Maison de la danse, Lyon (2016–2017). She is the director of cultural events and teaches dance and theatre at Leonteios School in Athens. She has taught choreography and improvisation workshops in many Greek and international dance schools, educational programs and festivals. In 2021 she created the first U(R)TOPIAS Academy of Choreography in Elefsina, an artistic and educational programme in collaboration with the 2023 Eleusis European Capital of Culture.

 

VANGELIS ARVANITIS

Architect / Adjunct Lecturer AUTH

 

Vangelis Arvanitis lives and works in Thessaloniki. After his studies at the Department of Architecture (AUTH) and his short internship in an architectural office, he started working in the field of architectural design as a freelancer, and member of the creative office Loopo Studio, where he remains until today. His architectural work includes interior design projects of various uses, contemporary art exhibitions and documentation exhibitions. His research interests concern the precarious conditions of work and existence. He uses different media from a variety of design fields (architecture, design, graphic design, typography, video games) in visual artworks related to phenomena of public life. He has participated in group exhibitions, publications, and art educational programs. He is currently completing his Master's Thesis at the Department of Visual and Applied Arts and Political Sciences (AUTH) entitled Art and Public Sphere. During the summer semester of the 2023-2024 academic year, he is an adjunct lecturer at the School of Architecture (AUTH) on the design of small-scale projects.

 

AΝGELIKI AVGITIDOU

Performance Artist / Professor

Department of Visual and Applied Arts UOWM

 

She studied Architecture (AUTH) and Fine Arts at the University of the Arts London, Central Saint Martins College of Art and Design (MA, PhD). She has exhibited her work internationally in venues such as the ICA (London) and the French Museum of Photography and has participated in the Thessaloniki Biennale of Contemporary Art (Performance Festival) and the International Biennale Performance Deformes (Chile). She was a member of the national  participation of Greece at the Prague Quadrennial of Performance Design and Space (2015) and the 15th International Architecture Exhibition of the Venice Biennale (2016). She is the author of Performance Art: Education and Practice (Routledge, 2023), Performance art: the basics (University Studio Press, 2020), editor of the volume Public Art, Public Sphere (University Studio Press, 2021) and co-editor of the book Performance now v.1: Performative practices in art and actions in situ (ION, 2013). Her artistic and research interests include the everyday, autobiographical practices, performance and politics, as well as performance, its documentation and the archive. She teaches art practice and theory at undergraduate and postgraduate levels in Greece and abroad and directs the Performance Art workshop (performance art practices) at the Department of Visual and Applied Arts, School of Fine Arts UOWM.

 

PETER BAREN

Performance Artist

 

He lives and works in Amsterdam, presenting performances and works of contemporary art. Selected works and presentations: The Weight of Love. Slovak National Gallery (Bratislava), Primera Trienal Internacional De Performance Deformes (Santiago), Peras de Olmo Ars Continua (Buenos Aires), Up-On Live Art Festival 2008 – 2020, Lushan Art Museum (Chengdu) / Fractured Bodies / Tempting Failure. Biennial (London) / On Alterity. FLAM Live Art, Arti Et Amicitiae (Amsterdam) / Preavis de Desordre Urbain. Marseille / Verbo. Mostra de Performance Arte, Galeria Vermelho (Sao Paulo) / Stage It! Stedelijk Museum (Amsterdam) / Deframed.  Infraction Venezia II (Venice) / Transmuted. Ex Teresa Arte Actual (Mexico City), Guangzhou Live, 53 Art Museum (Guangzhou) / The Manifold [After] Lives of Performance. De Appel Arts Center (Amsterdam) / ASIATOPIA, BACC (Bangkok) / Altered States, Live! Biennale (Vancouver) / Blurrr, 5. Biennial of Performance Art (Tel Aviv) / Currency. International Festival of Contemporary Performance (New York), Budapest Autumn Festival, Mücsarnok Palace of Exhibitions (Budapest) / Points of Reference. Steirischer Herbst (Graz).

 

PABLO ΒΕRZΑL CRUZ

Architect (PhD) / Postdoctoral Researcher

 

Architect with a doctorate (Universidad Politécnica de Madrid) and an expert in landscape design and management (Universidad Complutense de Madrid). His doctoral thesis focused on ritual space. He has collaborated in immersive theatre projects with Enrique Vargas and with the Tumulto artistic group. Since 2011 he has been teaching at the Universidad Politécnica de Madrid in the Master's programme in Ephemeral Architecture. In 2021 he was awarded an academic excellence contract (Margarita Salas Programme, Universidad Politécnica de Madrid). In 2022, he launched the research project “Performing Space”, which explores the relationship between performance and space and has since held an international conference in Nafplion every summer. He is currently conducting post-doctoral research on the performativity of ritual space at the University of the Peloponnese.

 

EMMANOUELA VOGIATZAKI-KRUKOWSKI

Interdisciplinary Artist

 

An interdisciplinary artist, she has been teaching at the Department of Theatre Studies (UOP) since 2004. She holds a PhD in Theatre Studies, an MA in Audiovisual production, an MA & BA in Scenography-Costume design, and a BA in economics. She has worked in theatre, cinema and television (BBC), both in Greece and abroad. Her portfolio (more than ninety projects) includes theatre, performance art, video and video performance art, short films, a fiction movie etc. She has worked as a researcher and artistic advisor in several EU-funded projects including FP7, Horizon'2020, COST Action, Creative Europe and Horizon Europe, and as a reviewer of European research proposals. She is a member of OISTAT, PESYTH and the Irish company RFSAT. She has published theatre plays, articles and chapters in books related to art, technology and science and is the co-editor of the book Modern Stroke Rehabilitation through e-Health-based Entertainment. Her research interests include contemporary set/costume design, performance & video art, interactive arts and technologies in performing arts, cyborgism, virtual environments and 3D sets, telematics and intelligent collaborative environments, mixed/virtual and augmented systems, serious games in the context of e-Health.

 

ADONIS VOLANAKIS

Visual Artist/ Scenographer/ Assistant Professor,

Department of Theatre Studies UP

 

Born in 1976, he studied with honours and/or researched at Wimbledon College of Art, Saint Martins College of Art, Aalto University, NKUA, and New York University. Since 2003 his work has focused on women's narratives and in 2006 he founded the meeting and collaboration platform blind date. He creates visual art installations with video, drawings, photography, performances, designs exhibitions, and actions in the public sphere together with communities in: United States (Anya and Andrew Shiva Gallery, Dixon's Place, Kimmel Galleries); England (Royal Opera House, Covent Garden, National Theatre); Greece (Documenta 14, Contemporary Art, European Cultural Centre of Delphi, Museum of Contemporary Art of Crete, National Museum of Contemporary Art, National Museum of Contemporary Art of Greece, National Theatre, National Opera House, Athens and Epidaurus Festival, Benaki Museum, Kakoyannis Foundation, National Theatre, National Opera House, Athens and Epidaurus Festival, Athens and Epidaurus Festival, Benaki Museum, Kakoyannis Foundation, Athens Biennale); Switzerland (Basel Archaeological Museum), Georgia (Historical Museum of Tiflis), France, Canada, Czech Republic, Finland, etc. Since 2005 he has been teaching and/or researching in universities in Greece, Cyprus, France, the USA. He has received support from Fulbright, Linbury, Onassis, London Institute, Arts and Humanities Research Board (UK), Leventis, Propodis, Spyropoulos, Vardinoyianneio Foundation and B & E Goulandris.

 

MARΙΑ-ΜΑRO GALANI

 

Choreographer / Performer / Performance Writing Researcher

Special Educational Staff, Dept.  EdU – SW, University of Patras

 

She holds a PhD from NAS & National Academy for Theatre & Film Arts (Sofia Bulgaria, 2003) and a Master’s degree in Creative Writing with a thesis on Performance Writing from UOWM (2019). She teaches at the University of Patras and the interinstitutional MSc in Creative Writing of UOWM and in Performance Writing at the Department of Film Studies (AUTH). She has taught at the Higher Drama School of DIPETHE Patras, at the Academy for TV, Cinema and Internet Communications and at the New Bulgarian University, Theatre Department, Sofia, Bulgaria. She is the scientific director and lecturer of the KEDIBIM programmes of the University of Patras “Performance: theory and practice» and ‘Creative & Performance Writing”. She has written on dance and theatre in education (Ion Ellin 2010 & 2011). She has published literature, theatre and poetry. She writes for the culture portal Culture Book. She worked in Greece, Belgium, Bulgaria, and Great Britain in more than thirty performances as a dancer, choreographer, performer and performance maker.

 

IRENE GEROGIANNI

Assistant Professor, Department of Art Theory and History,

ASFA

 

Assistant Professor at the Department of Theory and History of Art (ASFA) on the subject of the History of Contemporary Art, Coordinator, and adjunct faculty of the postgraduate programme «Performing Arts» of the HOU, in the Module “The Art of Performance”. She received her PhD from the Department of Architecture (AUTH). Irene conducted postdoctoral research entitled Towards a politics of performance: Correlations and divergences in performance art and performances of The Bacchae since 1968. Her monograph Performance Art in Greece 1968-1986 was published in 2019 by futura. She also co-edited the volume on the work of Maria Karavela, which was published in 2015 by AICA Hellas in both English and Greek. She recently translated Scenography and Art History (Astrid von Rosen and Viveka Kjellmer, eds.), which was published in 2023 by the Institut du Livre ‒ Kardamitsa.

 

ELENI GINI

Theatrologist (PhD) / ΜΑ Theatre Studies, OUC

 

She holds a PhD from the Department of French Language and Literature (NKUA). She has been teaching at OUC (MSc Theatre Studies) dramatology and theory of theatre. She has taught at the Department of French Literature (NKUA), at the Departments of Theatre Studies and Philology (UOP), and the Department of Spanish Language & Culture (HOU). She also taught drama at the Athens Conservatory of Music and Drama. She was a guest professor at RESAD. She collaborates as a dramaturg in classical and contemporary theatre and contemporary works of world drama. She translates theatre plays, prose and poetry from French and Spanish. She is a founding member of the Centre for the Semiotics of Theatre and a member of the Scientific Committee of the journal Theatrographies. She is a member of the Hellenic Semiotic Society, Persona Theatre Organisation, ITI, the Society of Communication Scientists & Journalists. She was a research associate for the International Research Project: Mapping Crisis. Theatre on the Contemporary European Stage: Theatrical Representations of the Refugee/Immigration Problem, Global Terrorism and World Financial Crisis led by OUC. She co-edited the 46th issue (June 2021) of the journal Acotaciones. She has published the monograph Ancient-themed Monologues of the 21st century. Signs and Discourses (Dodoni, 2023).

 

SOFIA GRIGORIADOU

Artist / Anthropologist

 

She holds a PhD in Social Anthropology (Panteion University) on Contemporary artistic production and/or in changing cities: The examples of Athens and Skopje (2023). She is a graduate of the Master in Fine Arts (MET) and the Department of Visual Arts (ASFA, 2013), as well as the Department of Philosophy, Pedagogy and Psychology (NKUA). Her research interests include the politics of memory and forgetting, material culture, cultural heritage, art in public space, food, sound and walking, and the intersections of art and anthropology. She has co-organized and participated in group exhibitions, art and research projects, workshops, seminars and conferences in Greece and abroad, and has taught visual arts at ASFA and the Municipalities of Chalandri and Gerakas. She is co-founder of TWIXTlab, a laboratory in-between contemporary art, social sciences and everyday life in Athens.

 

 

DIMITRIS DIMOPOULOS

Stand-up / Musical Theatre / Writer / Director

 

He started in comedy as a stand-up comedian in 1996 as part of the comedy group Comedy Nights. He has written four stand-up comedy solos, as well as librettos for the operas Twilight of the Debts, AirRossini and Yasou Aida! for which he was awarded the 2012 Karolos Koun Honourable Mention for Greek Play by the Association of Greek Theatre and Music Critics. He has directed the music theatre pieces Kafka Fragmente, Das Schubert Diploma and Evening Songs, the operetta Satanerie as well as the theatre pieces The Minions of Midas and Tsaika! As an actor and singer, he has collaborated with the Greek National Opera, the music theatre company The Beggars' Operas, as well as with commercial theatre and dubbing companies. As a translator, he has worked in subtitling, dubbing, theatre and opera. He speaks Greek, German, English, Spanish and Russian, and holds a degree in Acting (Iasmos Drama School), a degree in Tourism (Technical Education Institution of Athens) and is a graduate of the German School of Athens. In 2022 he completed (first in class) his MA at the Department of Theatre Studies (NKUA). During the 2023-2024 season, he is starring in his fourth stand-up comedy solo show titled A4, has translated and directed the musical The Last Five Years at the Alternative Stage of the Greek National Opera and collaborates, for the first time, with the Camerata Junior orchestra.

 

 

MARY ZYGOURI

Visual and Performance Artist

 

Born in Athens in 1973. She lives and works between Greece and Italy. She studied Fine Arts at ASFA (1994-2000). She completed her postgraduate studies with Distinction at Chelsea College of Art and Design, London (2001-2004). In her performances, she investigates, represents, and reconstructs the politics and poetics of the archive. Her gendered body functions as a vehicle and a means of articulating political and cultural records. The collective body composed, of the artist and her audience/participants are the main protagonists in a social, poetic ritual between protest, marching, and group play. In 2017 she participated in documenta 14 in Athens and Kassel (Palais Bellevue). She has exhibited her works in museums such as Galleria Nazionale d'Arte Moderna e Contemporanea (GNIAM, Rome, IT), Hermann Nitsch Museum, (Naples, IT); National Museum of Contemporary Art (EMST, Athens, GR), Mu. ZEE (Ostend, BE), MOMUS Thessaloniki and others. She has collaborated with institutions such as Cittadellarte (Biella, IT) IKSV Dutch Art Institute (Arnhem, 2016) Institute of Contemporary Greek Art (2016), and the Istanbul Foundation for Culture (IKSV). She has carried out a series of public projects and art residencies in Munich, Sao Paulo (Brazil), Istanbul, Venice, Rome, Naples, and Turin. In 2012 she was awarded by the Association of Art Critics (AICA Hellas).

 

DORITA HANNAH

Architect (PhD) / Professor in Performance Design,

University of Auckland NZ

 

Professor Dorita Hannah is a New Zealand-based designer and independent academic whose practice and research – operating across the architectural, performing, culinary and visual arts – focus on performance space and spatial performativity. Her scholarship and international projects address the dynamics, politics and intermediality of the public realm. Hannah has published on Performance Design and Event-Space while designing, curating and directing exhibitions, installations, performances, feasts, symposia and workshops. Her award-winning creative work has been regularly selected for exhibition in World Stage Design and the Prague Quadrennial of Performance Design & Space for which she has been National Commissioner (1999), Design Director (2003), Architecture Commissioner (2011) and Theory Curator (2015). In PQ2019 she represented Aotearoa NZ in the Fragments Exhibition as one whose «work keeps inspiring new generations of artists and audiences».   She currently co-chairs the Performance+Design Working Group for PSi (Performance Studies international) and co-convenes the Theatre & Architecture Working Group for IFTR (International Federation for Theatre Research).

 

DANAE THEODORIDOU

Fontys Academy of the Arts, The Netherlands

 

Performance maker and researcher based in Brussels. She studied Greek philology and linguistics at the Aristotle University of Thessaloniki and acting at the Drama School of the National Theatre of Northern Greece.  She completed her practice-led PhD at Roehampton University, London. For the last ten years, her artistic creation has been supported by the Flemish Ministry of Culture in Belgium and focuses on social imaginaries, the practice of democracy and the way that art contributes to the emergence of socio-political alternatives. Since 2009, she has taught dramaturgy, artistic research and creation at art schools in the UK, Belgium and the Netherlands. Since 2018, she has taught at the interdisciplinary MA “Performing Public Space” at Fontys Academy of the Arts (NL). From 2019 to 2023, she taught Acting and Directing at the School of Drama, Aristotle University of Thessaloniki. She is an Art Fellow of Westminster Law and Theory Lab, London. She is an associate artist for the IN SITU European platform for artistic creation in public space. She curates practice-led research projects and presents and publishes her work internationally. She is the co-author of The Practice of Dramaturgy: Working on Actions in Performance (Valiz, 2017) and the author of Publicing - Practising Democracy Through Performance (Nissos, 2022).  

(www.danaetheodoridou.com)

 

GRIGORIS IOANNIDIS

Associate Professor, Department of Theatre Studies NKUA

 

Grigoris Ioannidis is an Associate Professor of the Department of Theatre Studies at the Νational and Kapodistrian University of Athens. He is also a graduate of the Department of Electrical and Computer Engineering of NTUA and a graduate of the Department of Theatre Studies NKUA, with postgraduate studies in Philosophy of Science (King's College, London) and Theatre Studies. He holds a doctorate from the Department of Theatre Studies NKUA on the subject of Foreign Repertoire and its contribution to the formation of contemporary Greek theatre. His interests include, among others, modern and contemporary Greek drama, foreign repertoire, creative writing, and the use of new technologies in theatre studies. He has worked as a consultant with all the institutional theatre institutions, and he has repeatedly taught in theatre seminars, workshops, and meetings, as well as at the Drama School of the National Theatre. He has collaborated in curating central exhibitions on theatre and its history. He is the author of monographs on Greek and international repertoire in the Greek theatre, as well as a significant number of publications in academic journals. He was the theatre critic of Anti and Eleftherotypia, and from 2011 until today he holds the theatre reviews column in the Editor’s Journal.

 

ΜΑRIA ΚΟΝΟΜΙ

Scenographer/ Visual Artist/ Αssistant Professor,

Department of Theatre Studies NKUA

 

She is a scenographer and visual artist, and Assistant Professor in Scenography and Costume Design at the Department of Theatre Studies of the National and Kapodistrian University of Athens, She holds a university degree in Philology (AUTH) and specialised in Scenography at the University Arts London with a BA in Theatre Design & an MA in Scenography. She completed her PhD cum laude at the Department of Theatre Studies NKUA (2011). She has over ninety production credits for scenography and costume design in theatre, performance, opera and film, presenting her work in important theatre organizations and art and film festivals, as well as independent companies in Greece, Cyprus, Germany, the Netherlands, Canada, the Czech Republic, and elsewhere. Her research and publications focus on contemporary theatre practices and expanded scenography, theatre and performance in public space, new spatial forms of theatre and site-specific performance. She has published many journal articles and chapters and the monograph Modern and Contemporary Scenography: Landmarks and Developments (Kapa Ekdotiki, 2021). She has participated in academic exchange and research programmes in Greece, the UK, Poland, Germany, Italy, and Denmark. She was co-curator for Theory for the participation of Greece at Prague Quadrennial PQ15 and curator for the series of lectures “Site-Specifics” at the exhibition Out-topias at Benaki Museum, Athens. At the international exhibition Prague Quadrennial PQ23 she was part of the curatorial team for the Greek participation in the professional entry Α Rare Gathering and co-curator for the student exhibition section Rethinking Cities: Performing Places and Stories of Resilience, exhibited in Prague and Athens at the Hellenic Festival of Athens and Epidaurus. Academic webpage:

https://www.theatre.uoa.gr/anthropino_dynamiko/meli_dep/konomi_maria/                                               

 

CHRISTIANA KOSIARI

Choreographer / Dancer

 

A professional dancer, dance instructor and choreographer born in Athens. She graduated from the State School of Dance in 2012 and from the Athens University of Economics in 2008. In 2021-2022, she participated in the U(R)TOPIAS Academy of Choreography in Eleusis, where she presented the works Bouboulina and Bouboulina's. For the year 2022-2023, she was selected to continue for a second year at the Academy and to present the work Bouboulines as a site-specific performance in July 2023. As a choreographer, she presented her latest work RUNWAY at the Onassis Dance Days 2024. Her piece Chained was showcased at festivals such as the Arc for Dance Festival 15, Dance Laboratory Rhodes 7, and Patras Art Festival 3, and was selected to be presented at the Masdanza Dance Festival 28 in October 2023, where it received the second prize. She also choreographed the video dances Sink and Bouboulina, which were featured at various festivals in Greece and abroad. Additionally, she danced in Romeo Castellucci's production Ma and toured with the Siamese Dance Co. project Lamenta. She actively participates in workshops and has been teaching dance since 2007.

 

ΜΑRINA ΚΟΤΖΑΜΑΝΙ

Associate Professor, School of Fine Arts UOP

 

Associate Professor of 20^th Century and Contemporary Theatre at the School of Arts (UOP) and Head of the Department of Performing and Digital Arts.  She holds a doctorate and an MA in Theater Studies from the City University of New York.  She has also studied linguistics and philosophy at MIT (MSc) and UCL (BA).  Her research interests focus on performance analysis and contemporary forms of art.  She has published articles in internationally acclaimed journals including PAJ, Theater/Yale School of Drama and Theater Journal.  Her articles include “The Acharnians: When Savvopoulos met Koun” in Karolos Koun (Amolgos), “Lysistrata on Broadway” in Ancient Comedy and Reception (de Gruyter), and “Under the Starry Night: Darkness, Community and Theatricality in Iannis Xenakis's Mycenae Polytopon” in Theatre in the Dark: Shadow, Gloom and Blackout in Contemporary Theatre (Bloomsbury).  She recently edited the Greek edition of Scenography and Art History (A. von Rosen and V. Kjellmer), for which she wrote an introduction to Mary Zygouri’s work. She has worked for several years as full-time faculty in the Classics department of Columbia University.  She has also collaborated as a dramaturg with professional companies in New York, including La Mama and CSC. She was also a curator of art exhibitions.

 

PANOS KOUROS

Visual Artist / Professor, Department of Architecture University of Patras

 

He works in the field of art, bringing together knowledge from the areas of architecture and urban studies, archaeology and anthropology, political theory and social practice. His research at the University of Patras focuses on contemporary public art concerning the archive, performance and the politics of memory, institutional critique, dialogic practice and critical pedagogy. His work involves public interventions in response to urban situations and institutional art contexts, using diverse processes and media, from architecture constructions, installations and performances to collective modes of action and inter-personal encounters, mostly occurring outside art spaces. His work has been presented in the US, Greece, Germany, Mexico, China, Italy, the UK and other countries. Also, in the 9th and 12th Venice Architecture Biennale, at the 7^th Architecture Biennale of Sao Paolo (Urban Void), at the University of Kassel in conjunction with Documenta 12, MIT Museum (2018). He has proposed the concept of performative archive action in research programmes such as “Archive Public” (2012) and “Skulptur Projekte Münster Archiv” (2018). He worked as a Research Fellow at CAVS / MIT, the Institute of Cultural Studies and the Department of Musicology and Media Science at Humboldt University, and Harvard Center for Hellenic Studies.]

 

MELITA COUTA

Visual Artist / Researcher

 

She studied sculpture at Central St. Martins College of Art and Design and the Slade School of Fine Art in London. She has many solo and group exhibitions in Cyprus and abroad such as in Ostend (Beaufort 04 - Triennale of Sculpture), Brussels (Agorafolly Outside/ Inside), Paris (Chypre: L' Art au Present, Gallery Espace Commines), London (Somatopia: Mapping Sites, Siting Bodies, The Hellenic Centre), Lido / Venice (Openasia- 7th Exhibition of Sculptures and Installations) etc. In her work, she uses artistic practices as well as collaborative processes to raise questions around issues of identity, narrative, collective and personal memory. Since 2003, she has been directing and designing theatre performances in Cyprus, the United Kingdom, Malta, Poland and the Czech Republic. In 2023, the visual installation and walking performance she created for the National participation of Cyprus in Prague Quadewnnial (PQ23), was awarded the Golden Triga Award. Since 2016, she has been teaching at the Department of Fine Arts of the University of Nicosia as a Special Scientist Researcher.

 

ERATO ΚΟUTSOUDAKI

Αrchitect/ Μuseum Exhibition Designer

 

Born in Athens, she studied architecture at the National Technical University of Athens and museology at (AUTH). She has been involved in museum exhibition design and exhibition curation since 2004. Through her work she studies ways of creating experiential environments, engaging the senses in the museum experience and new ways of highlighting and framing historical evidence, with tools borrowed from theatre and cinema, while focusing firmly on presenting the personal stories behind the official history. She owns a company for museological studies and exhibition curation, specializing in modern Greek culture. More information about her studio’s work is at: www.eratokoutsoudaki.com

 

PANAYIOTA KONSTANTINAKOU

Theatrologist (PhD) / Dramaturg

Special Educational Staff, School of Drama AUTH

 

She holds a PhD in Theatre Studies (AUTH), a BA in Theatre Studies (AUTH), a Diploma in Drama (UKC), an MPhil (Research) (University of Glasgow), and an MA in ICT in Education (NKUA). She has presented papers at conferences in Greece and abroad and has articles published in journals, edited volumes and conference proceedings. Her research interests include: the history and theory of scenography and theatre architecture; the aesthetics and ideology of space; and the theory and practice of dramaturgy. She works as a free-lance dramaturg for state and municipal theatres, festivals and private companies in Greece. She specializes in classical plays, literary adaptations, youth theatre, documentary theatre and site-specific performance. She has worked extensively as a theatre educator in public schools. She has taught at the Department of Theatre Studies (UP, 2017-2019) and she currently teaches at the Drama School of the National Theatre of Greece. 

 

VITORIA KOTSALOU

Choreographer / Dancer

 

She studied psychology and is a self-taught dancer and choreographer. Her eclectic training, unbound by a single tradition, and her ongoing research from many different areas of dance practice and philosophy, shape a different perception and application of dance. As a choreographer and artist, she conceives dance as a way of being, a means of thinking and assimilating the world, and as a field of connection to the intelligence that governs the nature of things. She explores dance as a form of intelligence, a mode of existence that characterises all living beings and reaches the true nature of things. Inspired by the study of different practices, philosophies, and collaborations, her thinking extends to social choreography, through which she observes the world and at the same time devises works that convey the possibility of change or of expanding the way in which the world is perceived and understood. She is one of the founding members of RICE, a close collaborator of the choreographer Michael Klien, and a member of En Dynamei Ensemble. As a choreographer, she has created the works Day Out of Time (2017), Mount (2019), Rite of Spring – A Map (with En Dynamei Ensemble), Solar (2021) and Bare (2023). 

 

ILIA LAKIDOU

Theatrologist (PhD) / Laboratory Teaching Staff,

Department of Theatre Studies NKUA

 

She holds a PhD from the Department of Theatre Studies (ΝKUA) Her thesis was on Theatre Aesthetics of the Generation of the '30s, focusing on Spyros Vassiliou's stage designs (supervisor: Angelos Delivorrias). Her research interests focus on the history of modern Greek theatre with emphasis on scenography, the relationship between politics and spectacle and issues of theatre teaching in education and the community. She writes the plays in the series “School Stage” for Kappa Publishing. She worked on the establishment of the archive of the painter Spyros Vassiliou and the creation and operation of the Museum Atelier Spyros Vassiliou where she oversaw educational programs and curator of the permanent collection and temporary exhibitions (2003-2006, in collaboration with art historian Dr. Annie Malama). In 2011 at the Benaki Museum (Pireos Street), she designed and curated the exhibition Spyros Vassiliou and the theatre. She has taught theatre education in public primary and secondary education from 1997 to 2017 (permanent teacher PE91.01 since 2009). She is a member of the scientific organizational team of the research project “Experimental Application of Theatre Education in Secondary Schools”, implemented and supervised by the Department of Theatre Studies NKUA from 2018-19. She is a member of the Laboratory of Research and Documentation of Modern Greek Theatre (Department of Theatre Studies, NKUA). She continuously presents at scientific conferences in Greece and abroad.

 

LILA LEONTIDOU

Professor Emerita of Geography and European Culture HOU

 

Born in Athens, she graduated from NTUA (Architecture) and the LSE- London School of Economics (MSc Spatial Management and PhD Geography). She has been elected as Academic Faculty in four Greek Universities and at the Kings College London, serving also for two terms as Dean of the School of Humanities at HOU. She was also invited to the Université de Caen and the Université Paris 1- Panthéon - Sorbonne, as a Senior Fellow at the European Institute of the LSE and the Johns Hopkins University, and she offered courses for the MA programme “Mediterranean Studies” of UOP. A member of international organizations (UN ECE, SCSS of ESF, etc.) and Director of Research Units of HOU and the University of the Aegean, where she led twenty-four international research projects. She was awarded prizes in 2022 (EGEO) for leading the establishment of the first Geography Department in Greece (University of the Aegean), and in 2017 for academic excellence (OUP). She was honoured with a festschrift by thirty-five international academics (Propombos 2019). She is the author of The Mediterranean City in Transition, (Cambridge UP), the Greek books Cities of Silence (1989/2013), Geographically Illiterate Land (2011), and two hundred and fifty more books and articles in Greek, English, French, Spanish, Italian, German and Japanese (trsl).

 

ELENI (LENIA) LINAKI

Urban and Regional Planner (PhD) NTUA / Adjunct Lecturer AUTH

 

She is an Urban and Regional Planner, with an MSc in Architecture (Protection Conservation and Restoration of Cultural Monuments, AUTH), while from 2021 she attends the Postgraduate Programme at the Department of Theatre Studies NKUA in “Greek and World Theatre: Dramaturgy, Performance, Education”.  In 2021 she successfully defended her PhD at NTUA, School of Architecture (Section II. Urban and Spatial Planning, while from 2022 she is a postdoctoral researcher at NTUA. She has taught as a Graduate teaching assistant at the National Technical University of Athens in the Department of Surveying and Geoinformatics Engineering and at Harokopeio University. In 2022 she won the second prize in HackS+T+Arts: Circular Futures. Since 2014 she has participated in more than twenty conferences/workshops in Greece and abroad, in ten scientific publications in national and international scientific journals, books and research programmes.  Currently, she teaches as an Adjunct Lecturer in the Department of Spatial Planning and Development (AUTH).

 

IOANNA LIOUTSIA

Actress/ Theatre Director

 

Ioanna Lioutsia is a PhD researcher at the Department of Theatre Studies (UOP) writing her thesis on Performance Art in the Balkans: Aesthetics and Political Dimensions (1970-2000). She holds an Integrated Master’s degree in Directing (Theatre Department, AUTH, 2018), a BA in Acting (Contemporary Theatre Drama School, 2017) and a BA in History and Archaeology with a specialization in the History of Art (AUTH, 2014). She has participated in various conferences, some of them international. She works as a performance artist, actress, director, dramaturg, and Drama in Education facilitator. She was awarded the 3^rd Prize in the Performance Art Category in Florence Biennale 2021 for her performance Every Day is Woman’s Day. Since 2012 she has been writing regularly in the electronic and printed press on literature, theatre, visual and performing arts. She is also an active member of the Hellenic Theatre/Drama Education Network, and she was chosen as an External Expert in the Hellenic Authority for Higher Education. Personal website: https://johannali284.wixsite.com/ioannalioutsia

 

YOLANDA MARKOPOULOU

Director/ Artistic Director Polyplanity Productions

 

She is a director who creates interdisciplinary works, focusing on the use of specific sites and public spaces. She has directed more than twenty plays and short films. In 2007 she founded the artistic space SYNERGY-O in Metaxourgeio (www.synergyo.gr) and since then, she has been running the independent theatre, film and multimedia productions company called POLYPLANITY Productions (http://www.polyplanity.com). The performance We Are the Persians! (Athens Festival, ISPA – NYC, International Theater of Finland, mind the fact festival) was presented internationally, while the site-specific walking performance I_LEFT (initially presented in SYNERGY-O) became part of the 2023 Eleusis Cultural Capital of Europe programme, with which Markopoulou maintained a steady artistic collaboration until 2023. At SYNIKISMOS Festival 2019 in Elefsina, she presented I_LEFT Asia Minor. Her short films The Pyramids of Athens and It’s OK, My Friend! Showcased in film festivals globally. In 2011, she was nominated for the Eleftheria Sapountzi Prize for best woman theatre professional. She has participated as a mentor in the Atelier for Festival Managers twice, as well as in other international conferences for arts and theatre. She studied Film at Boston University College of Communication.

 

MICHAIL MARMARINOS

Director / Artistic Director Theseum Ensemble

 

Βorn in Athens. Ηe studied Biology (major: Neurobiology), Theatre Directing and Acting. His work is ruled by two persisting principles: a) Theatre is the art of the humble history of people. B) There is no moment in daily life which is not theatre, once the proper gaze is there; as well as every theorem inherent in these phenomena. In addition to Greece, productions of M.M have been staged and/or have toured in various international festivals, in: Austria, Belgium, France, Georgia, Germany, Holland, Italy, Korea, Poland, Russia, Serbia, Spain, Switzerland, and Venezuela. He has been invited to lead workshops, or to take part in presentations or seminars, in: Alexandria, Amman, Athens, Berlin, Caracas, Copenhagen, Greta, Florence, Los Angeles, Maastricht, Montreal, Moscow, Prague, Seoul, Tallinn, Tbilisi, Thessaloniki, Umbria, Wroclaw, Zürich on the following topics: a) Narrative: Elevator, creating instant dramaturgy (a methodology); directing as playwriting b) Chorus – an ancient form of modern reality: principles, methodology c) Acting and bioenergetic voice: a physical training based on Bioenergetic Analysis method. Member of the International Heiner Müller Gesellschaft. He is a Member of the International Bioenergetic Analysis Institute. He is also the Artistic Director of Theseum Ensemble, Athens (www.theseum.gr). From 2006 until 2009 he has been the president of the board of the International Institute for Theatre UNESCO (ITI) in Greece. Since 1998, he has been an Associate Professor at the University of Patras and the University of Peloponnese and since 2006, he has been a Faculty Member of the School of Fine Arts (AUTH). Since 2020 he has been the General Artistic Director of the 2023 Eleusis European Capital of Culture.

 

ANNA-ALKINOI MILIOPOULOU KOMPOURI

Political Scientist/ Adult Learning Educator

 

Anna-Alkinoi Miliopoulou Kompouri was born in Thessaloniki and lives and works there. She is a Political Scientist (AUTH). She has completed an MSc in Adult Education (UOM), with a dissertation on the Use of Art in the Education of Vulnerable Groups. She is currently in the process of completing her dissertation on The Art of Storytelling: An Exploration of the Role of the Art of Life Storytelling in Shaping the Identity and Memory of Refugees for her MSc in Art and Public Sphere (AUTH).  Since 2016, she has been working in the refugee-migration context in the fields of protection and communication. At the same time, she collaborates with individuals and institutions to organize educational and social inclusion actions in which various artistic practices are used. Among her academic and social interests are the role of art in creating an open world and achieving respect for diversity and strengthening empathy and solidarity.

 

EVANGELIA BASDEKIS

Performance Artist

 

She holds and MFA (distinction) from Lincoln University and a BFA from De Montfort University. She was funded by Artsadmin and participated in a mentoring scheme with Franko B. Her work is included in the LADA Archives in London UK. Her solo works have been presented in AD Gallery Athens, Toynbee studio London, VN Gallery Croatia, Ladden Gallery Munich, and Site Gallery Sheffield. Performance week Venice, Arnolfini Gallery, Tanzquartier-Museum Quartier Wien, Plateaux Festival Frankfurt, 1st & 2nd Biennale of Thessaloniki, Ujazdowski Castle Warsaw, Museum of Contemporary Art Thessaloniki, BIOS, Theater of Piraeus Athens, Museum of Contemporary Art Crete, also in: S. Korea, France, Switzerland, Turkey, Japan, USA, Sweden, Israel, Serbia, Italy, Portugal, Russia, Estonia, Armenia, Argentina, Montenegro, Czech Republic, etc. Evangelia curated the presentation of the Chilean artist Daniela Lillo Olivares (at Cosmos of Culture 2017) and the South Korean artist Gwang Cheol Gim (at Metapolis- Athens & Art Space Santorini) and she supported the realisation of Giovanni Casu’s art project Drawing the Horizon with the Sun. She was a founding member of CARTel Group with public space actions. Basdekis organized the one-day conference “Art, Nature, and the Anthropocene” for Re-Culture 4 in 2016. In 2018 she founded (with Margarita Kataga) the group Per Art Archives aiming to create an archive for performance art in Greece.

 

PREEMA NAZIA ANDALEEB

Visual Artist/ Performance Artist

 

She is a visual artist from Bangladesh and an entrepreneur and activist. Her tactile imagery and her contrasting approach aim to create visual tension as an instinctive, intuitive and powerful weapon to challenge stereotypical thinking about society and women. She performed all over the world to contextualize her philosophy on gender, sexuality, and women. She received prestigious residency grants from the Fukuoka Museum (Japan), Compeung Artist Residency (Thailand), Sanskrit Art Residency (India), George Keyt Artists Residency (Sri Lanka), International Performance Art Residency (Venice), Collective Signatures Performance Marathon (Spain) and more. She is credited with twenty-five extensive solo exhibitions (Bangladesh, India, Sri Lanka, Thailand, Japan, Canada, USA, UK, Turkey, Morocco, and Uzbekistan). She enriched her artistic career by exhibiting and performing at Brady Arts Centre in London (2023), Immersive Live Art Performance (2023), 58^th Venice Biennale 2019, Florence Biennale 2019-2021, Overlapping Kassel Documenta (2022), Asian Art Biennale (2012-2020), Tashkent Biennale, Istanbul Biennale, Venice International Art Expo. She exhibited at prestigious art fairs like Art Basel Miami, Art Asia Hongkong, Tuyup Art Fair/Istanbul, Dubai Art Festival, Delhi International Art Festival, Art Weekend Brussels (2019), and Royal Overseas Scholarship (2012). Currently, she is the President of Women in Leadership (WIL) and WILART, Chairperson of the Preema Arte Foundation.

 

MARIELA NESTORA

Researcher / Choreographer (B.Sc., M.Sc., M.T.P.)

 

A choreographer-researcher-Feldenkrais practitioner she studied Biology- B.Sc. Biology (Queen Mary and Westfield), Genetics- M.Sc. Human Molecular Genetics (Imperial College), Contemporary Dance & Choreography (London Contemporary Dance School, UK) and holds a Master's in Theatre Practices and Artistic Research from ArteZ (Netherlands). As choreographer of YELP danceco. she has already created twenty-three productions. She collaborates with institutions in artistic and educational projects; Duncan Dance Research Center co-curator (Moving Ground, The Living Project), ARTWORKS, Nomadic Academy research project (Munich) and she is active in collective projects (CCP, From stage to page, Omonia Collective, Green Park, Dance Association). YELP danceco.’s artistic work and research evolves through the encounters of theory and practice, and choreography with other fields of knowledge (philosophy, biology, performing arts theory). With the support of sponsorships, commissions, grants, and funding from the Greek Ministry of Culture, YELP has presented work in various European countries and at the Athens Festival, the Onassis Stegi and the Kalamata International Dance Festival. Webpage: www.mariela-nestora.com

 

DIMITRA NIKOLOPOULOU

Art Historian /Performance Based Experiential

Facilitator / Researcher/ Αrtist

 

Born in 1984 in Athens. She is a PhD candidate at the Department of Theatre Studies (NKUA) and holds a Master’s degree in Directing – Acting (OUC).  She graduated with honours from the Department of Theory and History of Art (ASFA) and the Department of Communication and Mass Media (NKUA). She studied at the Department of History and Archaeology (NKUA). The main fields of her artistic research are performance and pedagogy through the arts.  Since 2015 she has worked as a facilitator/tutor for the performance workshops of the National Theatre. She has held presentations and workshops related to performance at the Department of Theatre Studies (NKUA), University of Patras, and elsewhere. She received funding from Culture Moves Europe as the artistic curator of the live promenade performance Grapefruits in The City, part of the NKUA Student Participation in Prague Quadrennial (PQ23). She has participated in Overlapping Kassel (in the framework of Documenta 15) and Venice International Performance Art Week (2019). She is an artistic collaborator of the Greek Council for Refugees, The Municipal Theatre of Corfu, The Stavros Niarchos Foundation, Technopolis (Municipality of Athens), The Region of Attica, The Museum of Greek Folk Art, NGOs Praksis, Arsis, and others.

 

KOSTAS DAFLOS

Architect/ Professor, School of Architecture NTUA

 

PhD Architect (NTUA), New Media Arts MΑ Digital Arts (ASFA, Patras University), Sculpture (ASFA), based in Athens.  Ηe is  Professor of Plastic Arts with Performative Practices at the Athens School of Architecture NTUA. His research interests are directed towards the crossroads of art and architecture and in transdisciplinary areas of art. His practices focus on regular public sphere tactical performances with nomadic interactive devices and dialogical installations from recycled technologies (Cipo_) that he has implemented since 2003 for public performances with robots, in the direction of collective art practices and public art.  Recent publications (2023) Spatial Settings of Writing, Heterotopias of Reading: The Architecture of Art Praxis, University Press, Calypso, & the catalogue Notes of Topophilia (drawings, photos, texts), Blurb, Inc. https://ntua.academia.edu/KostasDaflos

http://www.arch.ntua.gr/index.php/person/ntaflos-konstantinos/

 

GEORGE PAPADOPOULOS

Dancer / Choreographer

 

Born in 1997 in Veria. Dancer, choreographer and teacher of contemporary dance and ballet. He is a graduate of the Higher Professional Dance School of the Greek National Opera (with honours) and a graduate of the U(R)TOPIAS Academy of Choreography in Elefsina. He has worked as a dancer in the team of Greek National Opera. He has also collaborated with choreographers such as Russel Maliphant, Antonis Foniadakis, Konstantinos Rigos, Ermira Goro, Paraskevas Terezakis, Olga Spyraki, Marianna Kavalieratou, Patricia Apergi, Pere Faura and Dafnis Kokkinos. Recently, he has been focusing on choreography and he has choreographed and danced in the context of the European project An Ideal City and at the 5^th online Festival of Greece of the National Opera with the choreography Butterfly. He also presented his new choreography Polluted – don’t look in the context of Mystery 59 produced by the U(R)TOPIAS Academy of Choreography and 2023 Eleusis European Capital of Culture.

 

OLGΑ PAPAZAFEIROPOULOU

Theatrologist (PhD) / Department of Theatre Studies NKUA

 

Olga Papazafeiropoulou is a graduate of the School of Law (1991) and the Department of Theatre Studies (1996, NKUA). In 1999 she completed the postgraduate programme of the Athens School of Law and in 2004 the postgraduate programme of the Department of Theatre Studies NKUA. She works as a lawyer, and in parallel, she is involved in theatre studies, but also issues of Cultural Heritage Law. She speaks English and Italian. In 2023 she completed her PhD (excellent) under the supervision of Emerita Professor Chrysothemis Vasilakou – Stamatopoulou with members of the committee Emeritus Professor Walter Puchner and Professor Kostanza Georgakaki, on the topic of The Theater of Greek immigrants in Australia: The beginnings 1900-1940. To obtain the research material for her thesis, she travelled to Australia where she studied the sources in the Dardalis Archives of La Trobe University and the State Libraries of Victoria (Melbourne) and NSW (Sydney). Since 2013, she regularly participates in conferences, mainly at the Department of Theatre Studies, Athens.

 

ELENA PAPALEXIOU

Associate Professor, Department of Theatre Studies UOP

 

She is an Associate Professor at the Department of Theatre Studies at the University of the Peloponnese specialising in Contemporary Performing Arts, Theatre Genetics, Performance Analysis, as well as Digital Humanities and Arts. She holds a PhD from Université Sorbonne-Paris IV. As a Fulbright visiting scholar, she has conducted research at Stanford University.  She has published widely, given numerous lectures as an invited speaker and participated with papers in a large number of international conferences. She has extensive experience in the implementation of research projects and the management of research groups. She is the Principal Investigator of the funded research projects “Thymele: A Dynamic Open-Access Multimedia Dictionary for the Performing Arts”, “Scientific Documentation of the Archive of the Athens and Epidaurus Festival” and “Genesis: Genetic Research and Digital Visualization in the Performing Arts”, while she has managed as principal investigator the projects “The Archive of Dimitris Papaioannou”, “CREARCH-CReative European ARCHives as innovative cultural hubs” and “ARGOS-Actes de Création et Dynamiques de Collaborations Croisées dans les Arts de la Scène”. She was the main researcher of the research project “ARCH-Archival Research and Cultural Heritage”, concerning the archive of the director Romeo Castellucci and is the academic consultant and curator of the above-mentioned archive.

 

GΙORGOS PEFANIS

Professor, Department of Theatre Studies NKUA

 

Giorgos Pefanis is Professor of Philosophy and Theory of Theatre and Drama at the Department of Theatre Studies of the National and Kapodistrian University of Athens and a theatre critic. He is the Director of Postgraduate Studies and Chair of the same Department. He presides the “Theatre-Philosophy-Education Lab” and regularly contributes to print and digital media with pamphlets and theatre reviews. He is also a Professor and Coordinator at the Hellenic Open University, where he has taught since 2008 history of modern Greek theatre and cinema (ELP44). He has worked as a dramaturgy consultant at the National Theatre (1998-2000), as a research associate at the Academy of Athens (2000-2003), where he was elected researcher (2003) and at the Open University of Cyprus (2011-2013). He has published about two hundred scientific articles and chapters in Greek and foreign journals and edited volumes, twenty-eight scientific books on theatre, philosophy, literature and cinema, a poetry collection and two translations. His book The Kingdom of Eugena.  Theodore Montselese's Literary Intertexts and Anthropological Contexts in Eugena (Alexandria, Athens 2005) was awarded the honorary distinction of best theatre study in 2005-2006 by the Association of Theatre and Music Critics.

 

CORNELIA POULOPOULOU

Biologist (PhD / Professor of Molecular Neurobiology and Neurophysiology NKUA

 

She was born in Athens. She is a graduate of the Biology Department (NKUA) and she studied on a postgraduate level at Cornell University USA, where she obtained her PhD in Neurophysiology/Neurobiology. She is a Full Professor of Experimental Neurophysiology/Neurobiology at the Medical School of Athens and is the Director of the Laboratory of Experimental Neurophysiology of the 1st Neurological Clinic of the Aeginition Hospital since 1999. The Laboratory's research interests include the role of neurobiology in the performing arts. Her body of research (PubMed, Google Scholar) consists of fifty international publications (IF=500) and six hundred references by others. She has thirty-year teaching experience at university and has led laboratory experiments at Cornell (six years) and UOA (twenty-two years). She has led numerous PhDs and MA  and BA dissertations. She teaches twο undergraduate and three postgraduate classes at the Medical School of the University of Athens.

 

AΝGELIKI POULOU

New Media Artist / Assistant Professor,

Department of Digital Arts and Cinema NKUA

 

Assistant Professor in the Department of Digital Arts and Cinema at the University of Athens, specializing in the subject History and Theory of Contemporary Art and New Media. Her theoretical and curatorial work is focused on contemporary art, with an emphasis on the theory of art/technology and new forms of the performative. She is a member of the artistic collective Medea Electronique art collective, where she participates as a curator and dramaturge. Her recent scholarly publications include the edited volume Greek Tragedy and the Digital (Bloomsbury, London, 2021) by George Rodosthenous and Angeliki Poulou, the monograph From Fruit to Root: Medea Electronique's Interactive Archive of New Media Art (Onassis Cultural Centre, Athens, 2021) by Angeliki Poulou and Eric Lewis, and the article Contester le Projet (Revue Agôn, Dossier No 9 “Rater”, eds. E. Baudou, A. Coulon, Q. Riual (Paris, 2022). 

 

EVI PROUSALI

Dramaturg/ Theatre Critic/ Associate Educational Staff HOU & UOP

 

She currently teaches at the Postgraduate Programme at the Department of Performing Arts at the Hellenic Open University and the Department of Theatre Studies UOP. She has taught at the Department of Theatre Studies (NKUA), at the European programme "Plato's Academy" (NKUA) and at the School of Fine Arts (ASFA) courses such as: Theory and Applications (scientific field of performing arts and directing), Multimedia and Performing Arts (scientific field of directing). She has conducted and published her postdoctoral research entitled: Performing Arts, Performance and Neuroaesthetics. An Interdisciplinary Study of Viewer Perception (Eurasia Publications). She holds a PhD (University of Patras), a BA in Theatre Studies (NKUA) and a BA in Chemistry (University of Patras). She has participated in Greek and international performing arts conferences, she has published articles and essays in Greek and international journals, as well as book chapters in edited volumes. As a playwright, she has written original texts for twelve theatrical performances (grant from the Ministry of Culture, 2022) as well as for the European programme "Creative Europe Intimate Bridges" (2020). As a theatre critic (since 2003), she has written about one thousand and two hundred reviews in the printed and electronic press (The Press Project, Avgi, Real News, To Pontiki, etc.). She is currently General Secretary of the Hellenic Department of the International Institute of Theatre (2019), a member of the Greek Philosophical Society (2011) and a member of the Hellenic Cognitive Science Society (2017).

 

PAUL REGAN

Visual and Performance Artist

 

Born in Dublin in 1970. He has a background in painting and image making and holds an MA in Visual Arts Practices (IADT Dublin). Recurring themes in his work pertain to faith, religion, ritual, cultural identity, and misappropriation. In recent years, he has developed a live performance practice to expand on ideas of compulsive action through site-specific interventions and activism. He has presented and performed at several international platforms including Manifesta (Zurich), The Venice Biennale, Art Basel Miami, Documenta (Athens), Venice International Performance Art Week, PAB Open Bergen (Nοrway), Performance Crossings Prague, Riga Sculpture Quadrennial, Performensk (Minsk), National Palace of Culture Sofia (Bulgaria), Akademie Schloss Solitude Stuttgart (Germany).

 

IOANNA   REMEDIAKI

Lecturer, Department of Theatre Studies NKUA / Director

 

She studied Classical Literature at the Aristotle University of Thessaloniki and holds a Master’s and a PhD from the Department of Theatre Studies (NKUA), with a thesis on: The Translations of Sophocles' Antigone on the Modern Greek Stage (1850-2000). She also holds a degree in Acting (Beginning School of Acting). She is a Lecturer at the Department of Theatre Studies (NKUA). Her research interests focus on interlingual translation, the political dimension of ancient Greek tragedy (issues of identity and otherness) and the connection between theory and practice of ancient drama. Her book Memory Theatre Company-Kydonia Theatre. Twenty Years of Theatre in Chania (2000-2020) explores the artistic and political functioning of a pioneering theatre company in a small provincial town. As founder and director of the group Ison Ena, she has written, directed and presented the performances: The Table (2006-7), Excavation of the Void (2007, 2008) Stories of the Museum (2008), Hamlet Space (2009), Sweet Ophelia (2010, 2011), Iera Odos 2 (2011-12) and Choriko (2013) in Greece, Italy and Germany, in theatres, museums, festivals, open public spaces and self-managed collectives, exploring issues of identity/difference and collective/political space.

 

ELIANE ROUMIÉ

Choreographer/ Dancer/ Performer

 

Born and raised in Athens, she is half Greek and half Syrian. She graduated from Royal Holloway University of London (BSc) and Bath University (MSc) in Business Administration. She then studied contemporary dance techniques in Tanzfabrik (Berlin), Dans Centrum Jette (Brussels) and Professional Dance School Aktina (Athens). She holds a Postgraduate Certificate in Physical Theatre, a collaboration between Jasmin Vardimon Company and Royal Holloway. She has professionally collaborated with Marina Abramović, Madeline Hollander, Dominique Duszynski, Ingri Fiksdal, Sevim Akpinar, Yelp Danceco., Patricia Apergi and more. Personal choreographic work has been presented at the Young Choreographers Festival/Haut Scene Copenhagen, SoloDuo Internationales Tanz Festival Köln, Solo Contemporary Dance Festival Ankara, Arc for Dance Festival, Dance Days Chania, 2023 Eleusis European Capital of Culture, Künstlerhaus Mousonturm, Solocoreografico Festival Torino and Frankfurt (Special Mention Jury Award). Eliane has been awarded the Artworks Stavros Niarchos Foundation Artist Fellowship in 2022.

 

GEORGIA SAGRI

Performance Artist / Associate Professor,

Department of Fine Arts ASFA

 

Born in Athens (1979), she lives and works in Athens. She studied cello and advanced theory at the National Conservatory and graduated with distinction from the Athens School of Fine Arts. She completed her MFA at Columbia University, New York (2008). She is a scholar of the Fulbright Foundation, Onassis Foundation, Propontis Foundation, and Leventis Foundation, and has received grants from the DESTE Foundation (2001) and Artadia in New York (2015). Since 2020, she has been an Associate Professor of Performance at ASFA. She systematically explores performance as a continuously evolving field of social and visual life. She engages in political movements, struggles, and the re-evaluation of concepts of autonomy, empowerment, and self-organization in her work.   Recently, she focused on «pathologies of performance»: her artistic practice and research on the body's conditions, which she calls IASI. Her works have been presented internationally in numerous solo and group exhibitions. She has participated in documenta 14 (2017), Manifesta 11 (2016), Istanbul Biennial (2015), Lyon Biennial (2013), Whitney Biennial (2012), Biennial 3: Thessaloniki Biennial (2011), and Athens Biennial (2007). In 2014, she established her studio, ΥΛΗ [matter] HYLE, as a semi-public artistic space in the centre of Athens. Her monograph was published by Sternberg Press in conjunction with the retrospective exhibitions Georgia Sagri at Kunstverein Braunschweig and Georgia Sagri and I at Portikus, Frankfurt. She has recently published Stage of Recovery (Divided Publishing, 2021).

 

EMMANUELA SAKELLARI

Choreographer/ Dancer

 

She is a choreographer based in Athens. She graduated from Anna Petrova – Maro Marmarinou Professional Dance School. From 2021 until 2023 she participated in the programme U(R)TOPIAS Academy of Choreography in the framework of 2023 Eleusis European Capital of Culture. After two years of artistic research in the city of Elefsina, she created the site-specific performance Dealing with Fireworks as part of the public space performance Dance MyS+eries / Season 2. Other choreographic works are: Remembering a Line Dance for Arc for Dance Festival 2022 and the video-dance work To Get There for Athens Video Dance Project 12. She was co-creator and dancer of the educational program Inner Movers, producing three video-dance pieces and three site-specific performances in the public space (Salamina Port, Monastiraki Metro Station, Municipal Park Eleftherias, Athens). She is collaborating with the contemporary dance company Aerites to produce theatre and dance performances.                                      

 

AVRA SIDIROPOULOU

Associate Professor, MA Theatre Studies OUC /  

Stage Director

 

Associate Professor at the Postgraduste Programme MA in Theatre Studies at the Open University of Cyprus, and Artistic Director of the Athens-based Persona Theatre Company. She has published extensively on the theory and practice of directing, contemporary performance and dramaturgy and she is the author of Directions for Directing. Theatre and Method (Routledge 2018) and Authoring Performance: The Director in Contemporary Theatre (Palgrave Macmillan 2011). She is also the co-editor of Adapting Greek Tragedy. Contemporary Contexts for Ancient Texts (CUP 2021) and editor of Staging 21st Century Tragedies. Theatre, Politics, and Global Crisis (Routledge 2022) and co-editor of a special issue on Director Training for Theatre, Dance, and Performance Training Journal. She was a Visiting Scholar at Columbia University, the Martin E. Segal Centre at CUNY, MIT, the Universities of Birmingham, Leeds and Surrey, the Institute of Theatre Studies at Freie University in Berlin and was a Japan Foundation Fellow at the University of Tokyo. Her most recent directing works include Anton Chekhov’s Uncle Vanya at Dionysos Theatre in Nicosia (December 2023); Karen Malpede’s Troy Too at Here Arts Center in New York (May 2023); Sophie Treadwell’s Machinal at the Cyprus Theatre Organization (2022) and Enter Hamlet (her adaptation of Shakespeare’s Hamlet) at the Verona Shakespeare Fringe Festival (2022).  She was nominated for the 2020 Gilder/Coigney International Theatre Award by the League of Professional Theatre Women.

 

ANDREAS SKOURTIS

Architect / Scenographer / Lecturer in Scenography

Royal Central School of Speech and Drama, UOL

                                                             

An award-winning architect, scenographer, Lecturer at the Royal Central School of Speech and Drama – University of London, and leader of the Scenography Cluster in the “MA/MFA Advanced Theatre Practice” since 2013. He studied architecture, and acting, and holds an MA in Theatre Design/Scenography (2001) from Wimbledon College of Arts, and a PGCert Teaching and Learning in Higher Education from Central (2016). His studio, Performing Architectures (www.performingarchitectures.com), has created buildings, performances, installations, and educational activities since 2003. Works include a new Performing Arts Centre in Kampala, and the New Stage of the National Theatre in Athens that was awarded a gold medal in theatre architecture at the Prague Quadrennial 2011. He has co-curated and designed exhibitions in PQ15 and PQ19, including the design of Staging Places: UK Design for Performance 2015-19 exhibition in Prague and the V&A in London. He co-curated the professional participation of Greece and the student participation of the UK at the PQ23. In the same exhibition, his work was shortlisted in the Performance Space Exhibition.

 

ELIZA SOROGA

Performance Artist/ Documentary Artist

 

Born in 1988, she is an award-winning performance and documentary artist from Athens. Working in a site-specific manner she explores interdisciplinary methods of re-inventing public space. She holds an MA in Performance Making (Goldsmiths University of London) and in Cultural Theory (NKUA). She was the Overall Winner in Performance & Video Art on the elevent International Arte Laguna Prize (Arsenale, Venice) and Artworks Niarchos Foundation (SNF) Artist Fellowship Program.  She has received commissions from the Ministry of Culture (Greece), Athens & Epidaurus Festival (2018), Hellenic Broadcasting Corporation ERT & ERTFLIX (2023), ZAO EXPO'22 | Togatta Residence 044 | 蔵王, Japan (2022), City of Athens (2019), Arts Council England (2013-2017) and many more. Her works have been shown at the V&A Museum (London), Royal Scottish Academy of Art and Architecture (Edinburgh), 3331 Arts Chiyoda (Tokyo), National Museum of Contemporary Art Athens (EMST), Prague Quadrennial of Performance Design, National Gallery Prague, MOMus, Art Athina Virtual, EYE Film Institute (The Netherlands), Clermont-Ferrand International Short Film Festival (France) and many more. She has been working for the award-winning Geraldine Pilgrim's company, she is the co-founder of the Performance Architecture School and works as a visiting lecturer at Central Saint Martins (University Arts London) and the University of East London. See www.elizasoroga.com και www.performarch.com

 

KOSTIS STAFYLAKIS

Assistant Professor of Fine Arts, Expanded Media and Forms,

Department of Fine Arts ASFA

 

Visual artist and art theorist with a PhD in Political Science from the Department of Political Sciences and History (Panteion University, Athens). He graduated from the ASFA and he also holds an MA in Art Theory and an MA in Continental Philosophy from the University of Essex. His works often take the form of navigation through the online and physical space of fringe social groups. His published essays delve into the relation between the mimetic, the social, and the political. He has taught and lectured at undergraduate and postgraduate programs of ASFA, the UOP, the UOWM and other institutions across Greece and Europe. He has been a post-doc researcher at ASFA and AUTH. He was curator or co-curator of the Outburst of the digital swamp (Overkill festival, NL, 2023), the 6th Athens Biennale ANTI, the 4th Athens Biennale AGORA, Weasel Dance at Goethe-Institut Athen, Twisting C(r)ash at the Batiment d’Art Contemporain Geneva, The Suspension of Litanies and Fuyuhiko Takata at ViZ Laboratory.

 

 

MANOS STEFANIDIS

Art Historian /Emeritus Professor NKUA

 

Ηe was born in Piraeus in 1954. He studied archaeology at NKUA. He received his postgraduate training at the Kunstmuseum in Dusseldorf and the Smithsonian Institution in Washington DC. He holds a PhD from AUTH. For twenty-five years he was curator of the National Gallery. Since 2004 he has been a faculty member of the Department of Theatre Studies NKUA, and now is Professor Emeritus. In 1990 he was the commissar of Greece at the Venice Biennale. Since 1985 he has been a member of AICA. He organized and directed the branch of the National Gallery in Corfu (1990-1995) and the private museum Frissiras (2000-2002). He has taught in postgraduate seminars at the NKUA,  Ionian University, Panteion and ASFA, as well as at the School of Guides and AKTO. He has been writing art criticism for the newspapers Kathimerini, Vima, Ethnos, Eleftherotypia, Eleftheros Typos and the magazine Anti. He collaborates with the literary magazines To Δέντρο, Η Λέξη, Ρεύματα, Mandragoras, Do(de)ka. He has presented many programmes on state television, ANT1 and SevenX, and radio programmes (on the Third Programme and Kokkino 105,5). He has organized art seminars at the Archaeological Society, the Hellenic American Union and Booze Cooperativa.

 

ATHENA STOURNA

Αrtist/ Assistant Professor,

Department of Performing and Digital Arts UOP

 

Assistant Professor of Space, Scenography and Performance at the Department of Performing and Digital Arts at the University of the Peloponnese. She trained in Theatre Design at Rose Bruford College and studied Theatre at Paris III – Sorbonne-nouvelle. Athena is the author of the monograph La Cuisine à la scène: boire et manger au théâtre du XXe siècle (PU Rennes, 2011). She is the artistic director of the Okypus Theatre Company, a multicultural company active in Greece since 2007. She has been a Visiting Fellow at the Casa de Velázquez (Madrid), at the Seeger Center for Hellenic Studies (Princeton University) and a grantee of the Friends of the Princeton University Library.

 

ANNA TZAKOU

Theatre Deviser/ Performer / Director/ Practice-based Researcher /

 Lecturer, Department of Performing and Digital Arts UOP

 

She studied contemporary performance in the United States (Naropa University, Boulder, CO). She holds a PhD in Performance Practice titled Geopoetics, a mindfulness (sati) site-specific performance practice from the University of Exeter (UK), where she integrates principles of Buddhism and geography with American and European methods of post- modern artistic lineages to create a body-landscape performance practice methodology. She has worked in theatrical productions/performances for the Athens & Epidaurus Festival, Onassis Cultural Centre, Athens Biennale, Athens Ancient Drama Festival and Cavafy Archives Onassis Foundation. In 2012 she founded group Geopoetics with which she has been creating site-specific walking performances in rural and urban landscapes such as Aigina, Nisyros, Syros, Athens (Eridanos River, Syntagma Square, Lycabettus Hill, Exarcheia), Thessaloniki (Yeni Mosque) and Cyprus (Akamas). Among others the group has been commissioned and funded by the Experimental Stage -1 of the Greek National Theatre, Pafos Cultural Capital 2017, Athens & Epidaurus Festival, Thessaloniki Dimitria Festival and the Greek Ministry of Culture. Ηer research has been published in the USA, UK and Greece. She has been teaching in BFA and MFA academic programs in Exeter (UK), Fontys (NL), DIA (NL) and UOP (GR). See: https://annatzakou-geopoetics.com

 

GEORGIA TOULIATOU

Visual Arts WCA(PhD) / Assistant Professor UNIWA

 

Βorn in Athens,  she studied painting at the Department of Visual and Applied Arts (AUTH), New media art & Video-art semiology at Wimbledon College of Arts (MA & PhD). Her work is focused on the construction and formulation of protective narratives (narratives of protective fiction) and the function of memory that supports their creation (counter-memory). Her writings are in the British Library (London, UK), Wimbledon College of Arts - University of the Arts London (UK), Department of Architectural Engineering (UTH) and in collective research volumes. Stills and video projects are in collections at the Museum of Contemporary Art, Thessaloniki, British Library, Museum of Contemporary Art of Baltimore, Maryland, US, Institute of Contemporary Arts, Seoul, Korea, ZAIM, Yokohama, Tokyo-Posttheater, Japan and Institute for Contemporary Arts, Moscow, Russia. She is an assistant professor at the Department of Interior Architecture, School of Applied Arts and Culture (UNIWA) where she teaches the subjects: Digital Forms of Art and Contemporary Art History (1960-2010).

 

EFROSSYNI TSAKIRI

 Architect (PhD) NTUA / Academic Fellow

UNIWA & ASPETE / Research Fellow NTUA

 

Βorn in Athens, Greece, architect and urban designer (NTUA: Diploma, MSc, PhD) with undergraduate studies at the ETSA in Seville (Erasmus scholarship) and postgraduate studies at The Bartlett School of Planning & The Bartlett School of Architecture UCL (IKY scholarship). Her main research interests are urban design, urban mapping and visualization through interdisciplinary and artistic means. She organizes workshops and has been the coordinator of funded research projects, such as “Apoplus” Ministry of Culture 2019-2020, “Revolutionary Palimpsests” HFRI 2019-2022, Covid-Mapping Ministry of Culture 2021-2022, “Loutrotopos” HFRI 2023-2024, and principal researcher in the Erasmus+ Capacity Building in Sustainability for Architectural Heritage program (2021-2024). Since 2013 she has been teaching urban design, architectural design, interior design and urban visual art at several universities in Greece as an academic scholar. She has presented and published papers at over fifty national and international conferences and has written an extensive, eight hundred-pages monograph entitled EIK-ASTIKA (Technogramma-med, 2024). Her articles are included in peer-reviewed international scientific journals and university textbooks, and she has edited four scientific volumes. She has also produced artwork regarding city images and has curated relevant exhibitions.

 

ALEXIS TSIAMOGLOU

Choreographer / Dancer/ Video Artist

 

Alexis Tsiamoglou works as a choreographer, dancer and video artist. He is a graduate of the Department of Geology (AUTH) and holds an MSc in Art and Public Sphere offered jointly by the Department of Visual and Applied Arts and the Department of Political Sciences (AUTH).  He was awarded the Artworks Stavros Niarchos Foundation Fellowship in 2021 and Spazio for Young Emerging Choreographers of the Emio Greco Amsterdam Choreographic Center in 2013.  In 2019 he participated in the 7th Momus Biennale of Contemporary Art with the installation Possi(ball)ities. His choreographic work Requiem – a choreographed portrait was presented at the Athens Concert Hall, Bios, & NTNG.  He has collaborated with companies, artists and choreographers such as Sinequanon, Christos Papadopoulos, Dimitris Karantzas, Robyn Schulkofski, David Zambrano, Dimitry Melkin, Artemis Lambiri, Yiannis Anastasakis, Dimitris Baslam, Marilena Katranidou, Margarita Trikka, Default, in productions of the National Theatre, the National Theatre of Northern Greece, the Athens and Epidaurus Festival and the Onassis Foundation. Since 2008, he has been delivering contemporary dance seminars as part of the ERASMUS+ programme, guiding young people to create their performances in their communities. These choreographic works have been presented in cultural centres, prisons and public spaces in Hungary, Germany, Italy, the Netherlands, Bulgaria, Turkey and Spain.

 

STERIANI TSINTZILONI

Dance Researcher (PhD)/ Assistant Professor

Department of Theatre Studies NKUA

 

A graduate of the State School of Dance, she holds a BA in Primary Education (University of Crete), an MA in Dance Studies (University of Surrey), supported with a scholarship by the Onassis Foundation, and a PhD in Dance (University of Roehampton). She has lectured at the University of Patras, the Hellenic Open University, the Professional Dance School of the Greek National Opera and the Greek State School of Dance. Steriani was the dance curator of the Athens and Epidaurus Festival (2016-2019), Programming Associate for the Kalamata International Dance Festival (1998-2015) and guest co-curator for Onassis Young Choreographers Festival (2021). She was a member of the Dance Selection Committee for Artworks Stavros Niarchos Foundation Artist Fellowship Program (2021) and currently is the Vice-President of the Dance Funding Committee of the Ministry of Culture. In 2020-2021 Steriani was selected at Harvard University Center for Hellenic Studies (CHS Washington) for the Visiting Artist Program. Her monograph Under the Shadow of the Parthenon. Dance at the Athens Festival of the Cold War (1955-1966) was published by Kapa Ekdotiki and was shortlisted for the 2023 State Literary Awards in the category of essays. She was a finalist for the 2024 Study UK Alumni Awards (British Council) in the category “Culture and Innovation”. She publishes in national and international academic journals and presents at conferences. 

 

SOFIA FALIEROU

Choreographer/ Performer

Artistic Director Dance Days Chania

 

Performer, choreographer, and artistic director of the contemporary dance company and the association Syn-Kinisi. Along with her dance training, she studied social sciences and works as a social worker and systemic family therapist in the field of mental health. In 2011 she created the International Contemporary Dance Festival Dance Days Chania, of which she is the artistic director. She coordinates and teaches groups of children, adolescents and adults focusing on creative dance and physical expression. She conducts experiential workshops in education and community settings as well as groups for stress management and emotional intelligence development in children and teenagers. She has performed in companies and solo projects from 1991 to the present. She was a movement instructor in productions for the Municipal Theatre of Crete (DIPETHEK), for theatre companies, individual directors and has choreographed more than thirty children's and teenage performances, as well as all the works of the contemporary dance company Syn-Kinisi.

 

CLIO FANOURAKI

Film and Theatre Director / Αssοciate Professor,

Department of Theatre Studies NKUA

 

Assοciate Professor of Theatrology-Theatre Teaching: theory and practice, Department of Theatre Studies (NKUA), and a film and theatre director, dramaturg, and performer. Her scientific and teaching work focuses on theatre/drama in education, the application of digital technologies in theatre, theatrical and creative writing, teaching Greek language and literature and foreign languages through drama, designing curricula through the arts, as well as on the subfields of social and applied theatre.  Her writing and directing work focuses on theatre and film for children and adults. She has written and directed the short films Phew! Freedom for All (2010) and Medea (2012), the film Xa mou (2016) and musical theatre performances for children and adults. She has created festivals and interactive educational programs focusing on theatre in the community, arts and culture. She believes in the transformative power of arts and play in education and society. See more information at  https://www.theatre.uoa.gr/anthropino_dynamiko/meli_dep/fanoyraki_kleio/

 

KATERINA FOTI

Choreographer/ Dancer/ Performer

 

She graduated with Honours from the Higher Professional Dance School of Rallou Manou. She has attended workshops with Olivier Dubois, Jasmin Vardimon, Lisi Estaras, Mathilde Monnier, Damien Jalet, Rakesh Sukesh, Narendra Patil, Lali Ayguade Farro, Peter Jasko and Linda Kapetanea-Josef Frucek (Fighting Monkey Practice). She attended the method theatre workshop of Theodoros Terzopoulos. She completed the residency and educational programme U(R)TOPIAS Academy of Choreography of   2023 Eleusis – European Capital of Culture in collaboration with Aerites Dance Company and Patricia Apergi (2021– 2023). She collaborated with Stereo Nero Dance Co. (2015-2021) as an assistant choreographer, a dancer and the basic contributor in kinetic material creation with presentations at Onassis foundation SGT (2021), Athens and Epidaurus Festival (2019), Arc For Dance Festival (2017 and 2020), Jarmila Jerabkova/ New Europe Festival, Czech Republic (2015) and HAUTScene–Young Choreographers 2017, Copenhagen. She participated in the Athens Biennale, the dance festivals of A Cielo Abierto network (Cadiz en Danza, Trayectos, Agitart Figueres and Lekuz Leku), and the festivals Danza Urbana, Bologna and Ammutinamenti, Ravenna. She has collaborated with sound designer Jung In Jung, performing together at Festivals in Spain and Portugal and also at Huddersfield University. She has also worked with Willi Dorner for the project Bodies in Urban Spaces held in Athens.

 

PHILIPPOS HAGER

Αssistant Professor,  School of Drama AUTH

 

Assistant Professor in Theatre Studies:  Theatre and Politics on the Twentieth Century Stage (AUTH). Ηe completed his PhD at Royal Holloway, his MA at Goldsmiths,  and is a graduate of the University of Patras. He has taught theory and history of theatre and performance at British Universities (2009-2022) and the University of the Peloponnese (2023). His research revolves around the multi-faceted relationship between theatre, performance and politics, with a particular focus on the intersections between citizenship, urban space and memory in Greek and European contexts. He has co-edited Performances of Capitalism, Crises and Resistance: Inside/Outside Europe (Palgrave, 2015) and the special issue Dramaturgies of Change: Greek Theatre Now (Journal of Greek Media and Culture 3:2, 2017) and has published in international and Greek journals, as well as edited volumes and conference proceedings. His most recent publication is the book Re-imagining Independence in Contemporary Greek Theatre and Performance (Cambridge University Press, 2023).

 

DIAMANTO CHATZIZACHARIA

Choreographer/ Dancer

 

Diamanto Hadjizacharia (Limassol, 1997) graduated as a contemporary dancer from Trinity Laban Conservatoire of Music and Dance in London and as a choreographer from Salzburg Experimental Academy of Dance (SEAD). As a performer, she collaborated with the choreographers Hofesh Shechter, Hagit Yakira and James Finnemore. Some of her mentors were Sabina Holzer (AT), Patricia Apergi (GR), Pavlos Kountouriotis (NL), Mary Nunan (IE) and Dara Milovanovic (CY). Her artistic practice challenges conventional approaches to art-making in an attempt to explore and redefine its boundaries. Her choreographic works have been presented at festivals in Portugal (Futuro Lugar International Dance Festival 2024), Greece (2023 Eleusis European Capital of Culture, ARC FOR DANCE 2022), Austria (New Faces New Dances 2021), the UK (Resolution 2020) and Cyprus (Cyprus Choreography Showcase 2022, Cyprus Choreography Platform 2023 & 2021, On Bodies Festival 2021, Summer Dance Festival 2021 & 2020, Dance Waves Festival 2019). She is currently a student of the ΜΑ programme “Performance Practices” at Art EZ University of the Arts.

 

ANASTASIA CHATZILIADOU

Theatrologist / Director / Public History

 

She holds a BA in Theatre Studies specialising in stage directing from AUTH and an MSc in Public History from HOU. She completed her studies in acting at the Theatre Research Centre of Thessaloniki. Her artistic and research interests focus on site-specific performances developed with Theatre of the Real methodologies and dealing with history/social issues with or (within) local communities. She has produced: Memories, a site-specific performance in an old watermill, I am your land, a site-specific performance on Giannitsa city, Silk, a documentary theatre at/for the old silk factory of Chrysalis in Goumenissa town, Come back as often as you can, a walking performance in the streets and forgotten landmarks of Giannitsa city, Invisible Citizens, a walking performance on homelessness, The war is not yet over… a site-specific performance about the Greek Civil War.

 

MARIOS CHATZIPROKOPIOU

Assistant Professor of Performance Studies and Writing UTH

 

Poet, translator, and researcher. His first poetry book Topical Tropics (Antipodes, 2019) explores issues of queer mourning and desire in connection to oral poetic traditions. It has been shortlisted for the State Literary Award for Best Poetry. His poems have been translated into English and Serbian. He has translated four books by Clarice Lispector. He has presented performances and lecture performances internationally (see indicatively: Oxford University, Mouvoir Tanztheater/ Cologne, Spinnerei/ Leipzig, Onassis Foundation, Macedonian Museum of Contemporary Art, Athens Biennale, Mostra Latinoamericana de Performances Urbanas/ Brazil, Columbia University etc.), and he has worked as a dramaturge in several productions (Athens and Epidaurus Festival, Dimitria Festival, Philippi Festival etc). He wrote the libretto for the performance Koutalianoi. History’s weight (All of Greece, One Culture, 2022). In 2023 he was a writer-in-residence at Ulysses Shelter and a Vakalo Visiting Artist at the University of Michigan. He is an Assistant Professor of Performance Studies and Writing at UTH. https://uth.academia.edu/MariosChatziprokopiou

 

 

BILL PSARRAS

Visual Artist / Assistant Professor,

Department of Performing and Digital Arts UOP

 

A visual artist and academic, he focuses on the convergence of performance art, installation and audiovisual arts. He holds a PhD in Art and Technology (Goldsmiths University of London, AHRC Scholar), a Master’s in digital arts (UAL) and a BA/MA integrated in Audio Visual Studies at the Department of Audio and Visual Arts, Ionian University. In 2017-19 he conducted his post-doctoral research (ICF Fellow 2017-19) on the connections between itinerant performance, creative technologies and geo-humanities studies. He has been supported by the AHRC, the IKY, the Onassis Foundation, the Stavros Niarchos Foundation, MOMus, NEON. He participated in international festivals, group exhibitions and cultural institutions in Europe, America and Asia (Onassis Foundation, MOMus, Thessaloniki Concert Hall, FILE, Athens Digital Arts Festival, Videoformes International Festival, WPA Media, Film and Video Poetry Society, Rooms2013, Out-Topias Benaki Museum, Nice!, Video Art Miden, Matera Festival, CICA Museum of Art, FONLAD, Cadence Video Poetry, International Forum of Performance Art 2023, Bari International Art Expo Festival 2014, Royal Academy of Arts Summer Exhibition 2010. In 2020-21 he was awarded the Artworks Stavros Niarchos Foundation Artist Fellowship. As the Artistic Director of Primarolia, he has co-curated the exhibitions Where Do We Go From Here (2022, with the support of NEON) and ISAXO_ACEUK (2023).

 

                       

YOUNG RESEARCHERS’ CVs

 

IOANNA ALEXANDRI

PhD in Theatre Studies, Department of Theatre Studies NKUA

 

She graduated with honours (2005) from the School of Drama at the Aristotelian University of Thessaloniki. She continued her postgraduate studies (MA) at the Department of Theatre Studies NKUA, from where she also received her PhD in 2022. Her doctoral thesis was entitled: Stage objects in Greek dramaturgy of the 1990s: function, meaning, perception and was supervised by Professor Giorgos Pefanis. As a theatrologist, she has undertaken the editing of drama theory texts, she has participated in scientific conferences and workshops, and her articles have been published in scientific journals, edited volumes and conference proceedings. Her research interests focus on modern and contemporary Greek drama, on theatre theory and theatre in education. She has worked for several years as a substitute drama teacher in primary education, as well as a facilitator of theatre groups in non-formal education. 

 

EIRINI ARTOPOULOU

PhD Candidate, Department of Theatre Studies NKUA

 

She is an honours graduate and a PhD candidate of the Department of Theatre Studies NKUA. She has received a scholarship from the Academy of Athens for her doctoral thesis entitled: Visual Determinants and Staging Quests in the Work of Dimitris Papaioannou: Local and International Selective Affinities and Influences. She is also a graduate of the Department of French Language and Literature at the NKUA and a diploma master pianist of the Gerasimos Kakalis Conservatory. She holds a Master’s degree from the Department of Theatre and Performing Arts of the University of Paris 3, Sorbonne-Nouvelle, with a major in Theatre and Art History. She has completed specialization courses in Museology at the College of Athens and has received awards and distinctions in music competitions. She has worked as a postgraduate researcher in university programmes at the University of Paris 3 Sorbonne-Nouvelle, in the fields of ancient theatre and stage design. As a drama teacher, musician and adult educator, she teaches in primary education, in Second Chance Schools and private and public Vocational Training Institutes. She has written articles for art catalogues and designed educational programs for museums. She has collaborated as a museum educator at the Children’s Museum, in the organization of an exhibition at the National University of Athens and she has participated with her works in various exhibitions.

 

YANNIS VARVARESOS

Actor / Theatre Director / Art Researcher

 

Born in Thessaloniki in 1989. He is a PhD Candidate at the Department of Fine and Applied Arts (UOWM) on Collective Body and Public Space. He is an actor, theatre director, translator, dancer, singer, writer, and assistant director. He collaborated with G. Nanouris, G. Kalabrianos, E. Efthymiou, T. Tzamargias, V. Paraskevaidou, and others. He has attended the summer school for clowns with Philippe Gaullier and other theatre and dance seminars in Europe and Greece. In 2022 he completed the Master's programme (MA) “Performing Public Space”, at Fontys University (Tilburg, Netherlands), receiving distinction (cum laude), for his research project Peripatetic (Dis)Courses. He is a graduate of the Andreas Voutsinas Drama School and holds an MA in “Theatre Directing – Acting” from the Theatre Department of the School of Fine Arts (AUTH) and the Department of Electrical and Computer Engineering (AUTH).

 

MANOS DAMASKINOS

Theatrologist / PhD Candidate, Department of Theatre Studies NKUA

 

He holds an Integrated Master's Degree from the Department of Drama, Faculty of Fine Arts (AUTH, 2013), an MSc from the Department of Theatre Studies (NKUA, 2017) and is a PhD candidate at the same Department. He has worked as an assistant theatre director for the productions of the plays: Pass-Port. Journeys to the sea in ancient Greek tragedy (2022) directed by Leonidas Papadopoulos (Argo Theatre-Amilia Ypsilanti); Mikrasia (2022) directed by Leonidas Papadopoulos (Municipal Theatre of Ilioupolis); Makrygiannis (2021-2022) directed by I. Vivilakis (Alkmeni Theatre); The Birds (2021) directed by Leonidas Papadopoulos (Vault Theatre Plus, Amalia Theatre); Spanos (2021) written and directed by I. Vivilakis (Holy Monastery of Dafni). He served as assistant artistic director, editor - proofreader - Head of the Organization of Theatre Analogues at the Municipal Theatre of Piraeus (2019). He participated as a theatrologist in the spring festival “The Dynamics of Greek Speech in Theatre (2018-2020)”, in the analysis of the play by Makis Tsitas, The General is making a fuss in the square (2017), directed by Roula Pateraki. He collaborated with the National Theatre in the programme Let's go to Epidaurus (2015-2019). He has presented academic papers in theatre conferences and his articles have been published in proceedings and other theatre publications.

 

CHRISTINA THANASOULA

Lighting Designer / PhD Candidate, Department of Theatre Studies NKUA

 

She is a Europe-based freelance lighting designer, writer, and educator. She holds a Master of Arts in Advanced Theatre Practice, strand of Lighting Design, from the Royal Central School of Speech and Drama (RCSSD London, UK) as well as a BA in Theatre Studies from the NKUA. She is currently working on her PhD thesis on lighting design entitled: Lighting Design Transformations on the Contemporary Theatre Stage: Theory, Practice and Education. Since 2002, she has designed lighting for over two hundred and seventy opera, theatre and dance performances, site-specific projects and events in most of Greece's largest venues, including the National Theatre, the ancient open-air theatre of Epidaurus, the Odeon of Herodes Atticus, the Greek National Opera, the Hellenic Festival and more. She is interested in productions that are multidisciplinary projects, enjoying the collaborative nature of performing arts. More information and online portfolio: www.creativelighting.gr

 

 

GEORGIA KAKARA

Theatrologist

 

She is an honours graduate of the Master's program of the Department of Theatre Studies NKUA, majoring in Drama Teaching (2022). She has also completed post-graduate studies in Creative Writing at the HOU (2020). Since 2002, she has been working as a drama teacher in primary schools. She has presented at academic conferences and has contributed to academic publications. She has also participated in research projects of the Department of Theatre Studies NKUA. She has written award-winning plays at school festivals and has contributed to school films. Her wider scientific interests include performing arts and digital technologies as research and social intervention tools. She has created dozens of digital stories, as well as a digital storytelling blog for applied theatre.

 

MARIA-SARRA KARPOUZI

Theatrologist / Postgraduate student, Department of Theatre Studies NKUA

 

She has a degree in Theatre Studies from UP and is currently completing her Master’s degree in “Greek and World Theatre: Drama, Performance, Education” at the Department of Theatre Studies NKUA. During her studies in Patras, she was responsible for the conception, organisation and coordination of various productions and installations, under the operation of the department’s Student Theatre Group. Her main research areas were the Theatre of the Imagination and the dramatic adaptation of poems (such as Octavio Paz's Heliopetra). After her graduation, she participated as a dramaturg and assistant director in various performances and small-scale productions in Crete and Athens. She has worked on plays of the classical and modern repertoire, as well as novel adaptations. Her research interests revolve around the relationship between theatre, performance, history and politics. Her primary artistic interest is the experimentation with new and different forms of theatre and currently is in search of places and opportunities to apply and expand her knowledge and abilities in the sphere of applied arts.

 

ELENI KELESI

Art Historian

 

She graduated from the History of Art Department (Oxford Brookes University, UK) having broad experience in a variety of positions such as archivist, photographer and curator. She has worked as an archivist and researcher for the Archive of the Greek contemporary dancer and choreographer, Lia Meletopoulou. She participated in paper restoration studios in museums of the UK and has worked as a volunteer on the archives of the Eastern Art Department of the Ashmolean Museum in Oxford and the Benaki Museum in Athens.  She has studied Japanese art, European printmaking, and Greek paleography and has researched eastern and western manuscripts and contemporary Greek art. She is currently studying at the Postgraduate Programme on Cultural Information Management at the Department of Archives, Library Science and Museology (Ionian University).

 

GEORGIA KOKKINOU

Postgraduate student, Department of Theatre Studies NKUA

 

She was born in Athens where she studied at the Ph. Edu. Ps. Department of the Faculty of the School of Philosophy NKUA. She graduated from the Drama School Praxis 7. She has taken courses at the Drama School of Vassilis Diamantopoulos and is a student at the postgraduate programme of the Department of Theatre Studies NKUA. She has attended a seminar at UOA on the subject “Dyslexia and its treatment with the multisensory method”. She knows English and French. She participated as a dramaturg in the performance The Dance of Fire by Aris Biniaris, led by Katerina Diakoumopoulou. She recently participated in the television series Trapped. An example of her work in the theatre is the performance Backstage directed by Loukia Michalopoulou, and the performance Kazimir and Karolina directed by Angeliki Karystinou. She has made one recording for Invisible Cities. You remembered from Michael Angelou by Konstantina Kollyris. In 2019, she adapted and directed the play The Righteous by Albert Camus, which was staged at the Off Off Festival of Epi Colono theatre.

 

MARIA KORONELLOU

Kindergarten Teacher / Theatrologist / Director

 

Graduate of the Pedagogical Department of Kindergarten Teachers, the Department of Theatre Studies and the Postgraduate Studies Programme “Greek and World Theatre: Drama, Performance, Education" at the Department of Theatre Studies NKUA majoring in Drama-Performance. She has knowledge of English, Spanish and Italian languages and participation in scientific conferences. Activities: a) directing amateur theatrical performances of cultural clubs, b) directing professional performances at the theatres: Technochoros Ergotaxion, Theatro Paramythias and Lychnos, c) writing plays, which are performed every year by a theatre group of a cultural club for charitable purposes, d) storytelling in nursing homes, as coordinator of a theatre workshop for adults, e) adaptations of literary texts and fairy tales for school performances. She wrote and directed the fairy tale Friends? Friends!, which was performed by the group Theatropaides in primary schools and kindergartens.

 

MARIANNA KOUKOULEKIDOU 

Dancer / Teacher / Postgraduate student,

 Department of Theatre Studies NKUA

 

Α dancer based in Athens.  She graduated from the Professional School of Dance Rallou Manou in 2017 and from the Department of English Language (NKUA, 2019). In 2022 she began attending the Master's programme in “Greek and World Theatre: Drama, Performance, Education” at the Department of Theatre Studies NKUA. She works as a classical and contemporary dance teacher, certified Pilates instructor and, occasionally, as a translator. In 2023 she started working as a substitute English teacher. Her most important collaborations are the participation in the short film for the mAPS project of Moz Productions 36 months - Fighting for Zac in 2021, in AVDP 2020 with Fanny Maggot's dance video Hélas, je danse, the participation in OurFestival4 in 2018 with the track Dançor by Demy Papathanasiou. In 2021 she co-founded the dance group UTTERAL dance theater holding the position of assistant choreographer and participated in the 10^th festival of young artists The 12 Compartments with the piece Unsaid and the production of the synonymous short film, while in 2023 she curated the movement in the show Tied up by ConstrActors. Currently, she is collaborating with the choreographer Olga Spyraki as a dancer in the preparation of her PhD research: Embodied documenting / project Ophelia. At the 2^nd Conference of Young Researchers Marios Pontikas in the 21st century, she presented the paper “The Wedding” of Marios Pontikas: Three Creators for the Revival of a Political, Greek Dance Theatre.

 

VASILIKI KOUTROULI

Theatrologist / Performer

 

She was born in Athens. She is a dramaturg and performer. She graduated from the Department of International Studies (Panteion University) and the Department of Theatre Studies (NKUA).  She holds a Master’s degree in Tourism Planning, Management and Policy (Aegean University). She has attended seminars in theatre, creative writing, and cultural management in Greece and abroad. She speaks English, Italian, and Dutch. She has translated the theatre play Peace by Rob de Graaf from Dutch to Greek. From 1993 to 2019 she joined theatre groups in Athens, Chios and the Netherlands. Since 2013 she has been researching new educational methods of theatre learning and teaching under the guidance of the academic-researcher Dr. Jurij Alschitz (World Theatre Training Institute).  She joined performance workshops with VesteandPage and Marilyn Arsem and she has participated in international festivals such as: ARtivism drives democracy, Lviv 2016, International Performance Art Week, Venice 2017, Public Space Performances, Krakow 2018, Inter.Nos Festival, Amsterdam 2019. She has created the group Donousa in theatre with her latest work being the walking performance They used to call me Ulysses...what’s my name? (Donousa, 2023).

 

KONSTANTINA LIBERI

Philologist

 

She was born in Agios Nikolaos of Chalkis in 1966, where she lives and works until today. She is a graduate of Classical Literature (NKUA). She has been working since 2001 as a high school teacher on the island of Evia. She participates in all school celebrations emphasizing the organization of theatrical performances. Most notably: The Spy (B. Brecht), Long Live Mesolongi (B. Rota), as well as a performance of students’ texts. She is also responsible for the theatre group in her school. During the 2023-24 school year, she has been preparing a drama based on texts on Antigone.

 

STELLA MAGGANA

Actress / Director / Puppeteer

 

She was born in Athens, Greece in 1990. She is a graduate of the MA “Greek and World Theatre: Dramaturgy, Performance, Education” (NKUA). She also holds a BA from the Law Department (NKUA) while she is a graduate of the Athens Conservatoire Drama School. She is an actress, theatre director, author, set designer and puppeteer. She has undertaken the scriptwriting, directing, and scenography for the music video of Vanessa Kourtesi Home. She has worked as a director, set designer and dramaturg in the following performances: Alice in Wonderland is NOT a book (2020, Bagkeion) and 8΄19΄΄ (2018, Beep). In 2023 she created the puppet performance Nude based on the dramaturgy of 8΄19΄΄. As a theatre actress, she has collaborated with TOPI Theater Group in the productions: Grim and Grim, The Nutcracker and Fairy Tales to Make You Laugh. In theatre, she has also worked with Electra Frangiadaki, Angela Brouskou, Maria Vardaka. As a set designer she has worked with TOPI Theater Group in Grim and Grim and The Nutcracker, while she has undertaken the scenography for the performance Strong Voices created by ArtObsessions Theatre Group. She has attended performance classes at London Lispa (London International School of Performing Arts) with Thomas Prattki physical theatre classes with Costas Philippoglou, scenography with Maria Chaniwtaki (LSA) and puppeteering with Stathis Markopoulos (Ayusaya!).

 

KONSTANTINOS MAKRIDAKIS

PhD Candidate, Department of Theatre Studies NKUA

 

He was born in Athens in 1987 and grew up in Rethymno. He studied at the Faculty of Philosophy (University of Crete, Rethymno), at the Department of Filología y Letras of the Universidad de Valladolid (Erasmus), and acting at Veaki National School of Dramatic Art. He participated in theatre productions of the Michalis Kakogiannis Foundation and the National Opera of Greece while directing Loula Anagnostaki's The Parade at the Underground Theater (2017) and the theatre play Eurydice by Jean Anouilh, at the stage of the National School of Fine Arts in Athens (2018). He is also a graduate of the Department of Theatre Studies (UOP, 2021) and in 2023 he completed the MA in “Greek and World Theatre: Drama, Performance, Education” at the Department of Theatre Studies NKUA. He is a PhD candidate at the same department with his doctoral thesis titled: A Comparative Approach on Contemporary Queer Performance in Greece and Spain: the cases of Athens and Barcelona. In 2012, he published his poetry collection titled Rusty Materials and in 2021 the theatre play Medea by Gutenberg Editions.

 

EUGENIA MARAGOU

Actress / Theatrologist / Playwright

 

She graduated from Panteion University (Political Science), the Themelio Drama School and the Department of Theatre Studies NKUA and holds a Master’s degree in “Greek and World Theatre: Drama, Performance, Education” from the same department. She is currently completing a “Cultural and Cinema Studies Master’s Degree”  at NKUA.  She is working as a drama teacher in primary school and provided auxiliary teaching work in the Department of Theatre Studies at the University of Athens as an academic scholar (2021-2022). She is being active in acting and writing theatre and scripts for documentary films. Her research interests focus on theatre for young audiences, contemporary theatre and performance. She has written articles in reference books, journals and conference papers. Her plays for minors and adults have been presented to the public, have been awarded by the Greek Writers Association and have received State Commendation.

 

ANNA MATZIARI

Postgraduate student, Department of Theatre Studies NKUA

 

She was born in Thessaloniki but grew up in Athens, where she graduated from Varvakeios Protypos Sxoli and the Department of Mathematics (NKUA) in Stochastic Operations Research. She completed the postgraduate program at the University of Piraeus with a specialization in Corporate and Bank Management and holds an MSc degree. She passed examinations to work at the National Bank, where she is still working in business financing. Since September 2022, she has been attending the postgraduate programme in Theatre Studies (NKUA), currently writing her thesis. Additionally, she is enrolled in the remote program at the University of Lille, focusing on Modern Greek Studies. She participated in the conference on Marios Pontikas with an original play under the title Having conversations with the “Internal News” of Marios Pontikas, as well as participating in the interdisciplinary-artistic symposium Creating Polyphonic Spaces of Meaning, Learning, and Development: Playful Alternative-Experiential and Embodied-Polyphonic Psycho-pedagogical Approaches according to Bakhtin held in Rethymno in September 2023 in which she presented her original play Parallel Monologues of Fonissa Papadiamantis  Etranger Camus. She is proficient in English, French, Spanish, and German.

 

APHRODITE MITSOPOULOU

Actress / Director / Architect

 

She is a graduate of the MA in “Greek and World Theatre: Dramaturgy, Performance, Education” (NKUA). She also holds an MA from the Department of Architecture (AUTH), and a degree from Archi Drama School. She won the first prize in an architectural competition for the study of the Bridge project implemented in Larissa in 2006. She collaborated with Nella Golanda for the study of the regeneration of the area around the ancient theatre of Larissa. She has acted in plays and films and has collaborated with the group Peeping Tom in the show A louer at the Athens Festival. He has written the script and starred in the short film Fuck freedom directed by Nikos Vouteniotis (International Drama Festival). She has participated in the Prague Quadrennial 2023 with the production Grapefruits or the Seasons in the City, a site-specific performance funded by the European Union and the Culture Moves Europe program, artistically curated by Dimitra Nikolopoulou. She has directed, among others, the performances Agoramana, (KET 2022-2023, PLYFA 2024) which was based on the podcast of the same name that participated in the Documentary Thessaloniki 2021 festival, Penelopes (KET 2017) and the children’s show Poulia and Augerinos (Studio Mavromichalis 2012).

 

KATERINA BILALI

Actress/Theatrologist/

Postgraduate student, Department of Theatre Studies NKUA

 

Katerina Bilali is a Greek actress, theatrologist and translator. She is a postgraduate student at the Department of Theatre Studies (NKUA). She received her BFA (Excellent First) from the Department of Theatre Studies (UP, 2021), and her BFA in Performing Arts from the Drama School of the Athens Conservatory (1999). She speaks English and Italian.  As an actress in the theatre, she has taken part in more than 30 performances collaborating with the National Theatre of Greece, the Regional-Municipal Theatre of Lamia, the Regional-Municipal Theatre of Ioannina, but also with many Greek theatre ensembles. She was nominated for the all4fun Award for Best Female Performance (2015), as well as for the Academy of Greek Art Awards (2018). She has appeared on television in several TV series, but also as a TV hostess in TV games on Ant-1 Channel. She has translated many theatre plays, published by Heridanos Publications. Also, several of her academic articles have been published in various theatre and literary publications.

 

MARI-SOUZAN MOUZELA

    Performer / Violinist /

Postgraduate student, Department of Theatre Studies NKUA

 

She is a graduate and postgraduate student with a major in Dramaturgy and Performance at the Department of Theatre Studies NKUA. She has a Diploma in Violin, a Degree in Harmony, and Certification in Voice and Singing (NKUA). She studied monody with Dimitris Kavrakos. She participates as an actress, mezzo-soprano and violinist in the musical theatre Treasure Island by Robert Louis Stevenson directed by Thomas Moschopoulos at the Porta Theater. She participated in workshops with Jake Harders, Thomas Moschopoulos, Cheryl Studer, Dimitris Tiliakos, Leonidas Kavakos, Elizabeth Roxas, Chet Walker, Giorgos Hatzinikos, Dimitris Toufexis. She took part as performer and director in artistic programs of seven theatre conferences in collaboration with the University of Theatre Studies (NKUA) with recent works: performance Hidden Sun by I. Kambanellis, Transformations of Memory 1922–2022, screen-based performance Trombone- Mechanisms of Power based on Trombone by M. Pontikas. She participated as a performer in the theatrical performances 404 permission not found at the Open Air Theatre of Colonus, The last garment at Studio Mavromichalis, an actor in a short film at the Byzantine Museum of Athens, as a member of the String Orchestra of the E.M.P. under the musical direction of the Conductor M. Oikonomou, as a violinist in the Library and the Polychorus of the Athens Concert Hall, as a mezzo-soprano in the Trianon Hall, in the Alexandria Polychorus, in the Averof EEL Hall, as a dancer in the Roes Theatre. She received a certificate for her voluntary contribution to the Opening Ceremony of the 25-year Boris Christoff Art Festival at the Sofia Museum.

 

NATASHA DAILIANI

Performer / Playwright / Director/

Postgraduate student, Department of Theatre Studies NKUA

 

She is a performer-creator, director and writer for theatre and co-founder of the theatre company gARTen. She was born and raised in Heidelberg, Germany. She studied acting at the London Academy of Performing Arts in London and is a graduate of the Athens Law School. She is attending the “MA Greek and World Theatre. Dramaturgy, Performance, and Education” in the Department of Theatre Studies NKUA, with a specialization in Translation and Creative Writing. Among others, she wrote and directed the performance Buy me, a performance about homo consumens (Underground Theatre, 2017) and the play Civil war love stories (Platform Civil War, Experimental Stage National Theatre of Greece, March 2016). Most recently, she directed her play Again (PLYFA space for the arts, Performing Arts Theatre Bageion, 2022). The text of the play was published by Aparsis Publications in the series New Theatre Texts (July 2022). She also wrote, directed, and participated as a performer in the site-sensitive performance RED Routes Project: Abandoned, once upon a time at the Lycabettus Festival (May 2022). See also www.natassadailiani.com

 

MAGDALINI NTOUROU

Postgraduate student, Department of Theatre Studies NKUA

 

She studied English Language and Literature (NKUA), acting at Ιasmos and Delos Drama School, and acquired an MA in Theatre: Visual Language of Performance at Wimbledon College of Arts, University Arts London. She is currently a postgraduate student at the Department of Theatre Studies (NKUA). She has worked as a mentor in the MA in Dance and Embodied Practices (School of Arts, Royal Conservatoire, Antwerp) (2020- 2021). As an accredited teacher of IBDP (International Baccalaureate Diploma) in Visual Arts, she has taught the Theatre IB Diploma course and the Literature and Performance course, while working as a performer, visual artist and English teacher in private and public schools. She collaborated with theatre directors and music bands as a performer and a visual artist. She has also worked as a film festival correspondent and presenter for a television show and as a translator and reader for publishing houses. She has participated in art and photography exhibitions and conferences and has attended seminars in documentary filmmaking, editing and dance.  

 

ANGELIKI NTOUFA

Theatrologist / Postgraduate student, Department of Theatre Studies NKUA

 

During her undergraduate studies at the Department of Theatre Studies at the University of Patras she was involved in the study of European and Greek theatre, the works of ancient tragic and comic authors, and Roman theatre. She researched a variety of topics in ancient theatre, i.e. the existence of the tragic chorus and choral polyphony, the expression of fear of the enemy in the play Seven on Thebes; also Euripides’s female characters about gender issues through contemporary approaches to ancient theatre on the modern Greek stage, as well as the transformations of ancient Greek myths in post-war and contemporary drama. She has attended seminars at the National Theatre of Greece, the National Academy of Athens and the University of Patras. She participated in the 2nd Conference of Young Researchers “Marios Pontikas in the 21st century” with the presentation “The redefinition of the tradition of the myth of Oedipus Tyrannus in M. Pontikas' play The Killer of Laius and the Ravens”.  She also took part in the Interdisciplinary-Artistic Symposium “Creating Polyphonic Places of Meaning, Learning and Development: Playful Alternatives - Experiential and Embodied Multimodal Psychopedagogical Approaches” with the presentation “Artificial Intelligence: Performance and Impact in the Contemporary Artistic Field”.

 

GIOTA PANAGI

Postgraduate student, Department of Theatre Studies NKUA

 

She was born in Ioannina and currently lives and works in Athens as a dramaturg and theatre practitioner. Her academic background includes studies in music and cultural anthropology and postgraduate studies majoring in Theatre Dramaturgy at the Department of Theatre Studies NKUA.  In 2007, she studied at Delos Dramatic School of Acting and participated in masterclasses led by theatre artists both in Greece and abroad, engaging in festivals and research activities. Through these experiences, she explored various facets of theatre, encompassing directing, dramaturgy, and educational drama. Since 2013, she has been working in the theatre as an actor, director, and dramaturg. She has collaborated with the National Theatre of Greece, the Onassis Stegi, and the Athens and Epidaurus Festival. Additionally, she has collaborated with the Municipal and Regional Theatre of Ioannina. She has participated in research programmes aimed at renewing approaches to ancient drama dramaturgy. Her work explores theatrical acts that take place in public spaces and their reinterpretation through the arts. In 2021, she created performances centred on heritage sites, adapted for the theatre, and wrote two plays based on field research. Her interests primarily revolve around the performative event, stage dramaturgy, rhythm, and sound as tools of stage dramaturgy.

 

VANGELIS PAPADAKIS

Director/ Actor / Architect

 

 He studied Architecture and Theatre in France with postgraduate studies in Art and Architecture. He collaborated with Lydia Koniordou as assistant director in the National Theatre productions Hippolytus and Simigdalenios. He has starred in performances of classical and contemporary repertoire and has participated in television series. He has directed Alan Bennett's Talking Heads, The Beast in the Moon, A Pornographic Relationship, The Seagull, a film in progress. As a performer, he participated in Cheapart 24 with the performance Embracing Otherness, in the site-specific project DourgoutiIsland of the group No play, while he presented his solo performance to my unborn child, in the art exhibition OUTopias, at Benaki Museum. He has been credited with sets and costumes for theatre and dance performances. He is a postgraduate student of the Department of Theatre Studies NKUA. He served as Advisor to the Minister of Culture (2016-2018) and was a member of the Board of the National Gallery 2017-2023.

 

ELEFTERIA RAPTOU

Theatrologist / PhD candidate NΤUA / Theatre Critic

 

She is an NTUA PhD candidate, theatrologist and researcher, graduate of the Department of Theatre Studies (NKUA) and the Department of Nursing (NKUA). She holds a Master’s degree (MSc) from the School of Architecture (NTUA), in Design-Space-Culture. She served as a Special Advisor for Cultural Policy at the Greek Ministry of Culture, and as a member of international scientific groups for cultural issues. She has been Vice-President of the Board of Directors of the Athens and Epidaurus Festival. She is a founding member of the Hellenic Association of Theatre and Performing Arts Critics. In the field of theory, she systematically deals with the writing of theoretical texts on theatre, performance art, cultural policy, and theatre for children as well as with translations and editing of plays and theoretical studies. She is a regular columnist and theatre critic writing in the daily and periodical press. She has collaborated with the Athens and Epidaurus Festival, for the Publications Department. As a researcher, she participates in the postgraduate course at the NTUA School of Architecture and Engineering with lectures, while she teaches  at primary education and post-secondary educational structures.

 

ANGELIKI STRATAKI

Actress / Theatrologist / Theatre Educator

 

She was born and raised in Athens. She studied acting at the Drama School of the Karolos Koun Art Theatre and graduated from the Arhi Drama School in 2016. She completed her undergraduate studies (with honours) at the Department of Theatre Studies (NKUA) in 2021, where she is currently pursuing her studies in the MA Program “Greek and World Theatre: Drama, Performance, Education” majoring in Drama and Performance. As an actress she took part in the following performances: Grapefruits or the Seasons in the City (site-specific performance, concept/dramaturgy Dimitra Nikolopoulou, Prague Quadrennial 2023 & Athens 2024); HOPA! (site-specific performance, concept/dramaturgy Stella Maggana, Afroditi Mitsopoulou, Angeliki Strataki, Exarcheia square, Athens); Narratives, testimonies, martyrs. 1922, direction and dramaturgy Michaela Antoniou, Vault Theatre Plus, Festival Vrachon (Under the Shadows of the Rocks 2022); Women fighters, direction and dramaturgy Michaela Antoniou, Festival Vrachon (Under the Shadows of the Rocks 2021), Festival ART4MORE 2021; Chrysa Spiliotis’s Doors, direction Michaela Antoniou, Festival Analogio, Stathmos Theatre, 2019; Victor Hugo’s Lucrezia Borgia, direction Nikita Milivojevic, Athens Festival, 2015. As a theatrologist-teaching artist, she has participated in conferences, publications and theatre educational programmes.

 

ERO TZINTROUDI-GAITANIDI

Postgraduate student, Department of Theatre Studies NKUA

 

She was born in Volos in 1996. She is a graduate of the Law School of Athens and a member of the Athens Bar Association. She has also studied at the Law School of the University of Luxembourg as part of the Erasmus program. Since 2022, she has been a postgraduate student in the Department of Theatre Studies NKUA majoring in Drama and Performance. In October 2023, she participated in the postgraduate conference of the Department of Theatre Studies Marios Pontikas in the 21st century with a paper on «The concept of the nation in the drama of Marios Pontikas: the case of the National Holiday». In 2023, her video artwork titled Oedipo, which was implemented as part of the Gender Issues in Ancient Theatre course, was screened in a special screening of the artistic project Pugnant Films at the Quarries of Korydallos. In 2018, she presented a dance performance at the SouzyTros space of Maria Papadimitriou in Eleonas. She speaks English fluently. She has been a national and Balkan swimming champion and a member of the National Swimming Team (2009-2013).

 

EVA FRAKTOPOULOU

Actress / Postgraduate student, Department of Theatre Studies NKUA

 

Born and raised in Athens. She graduated from the National Theatre of Greece Drama School (in Acting) and the Department of Political Science and International Relations (UOP). She is currently completing her studies in the postgraduate programme “Greek and World Theatre: Drama, Performance, Education” at the Department of Theatre Studies NKUA majoring in Τheatre and Εducation. Her Master's thesis includes both a practical and a theoretical part: she dramaturgically edited and adapted the literary text of Edouard Louis Change: Method, and based on this text, she directed a play for teenagers. Her research interests include dramaturgy, performance (both in its practical and theoretical form), and applied theatre. She has attended several acting seminars, while in recent years she has worked as an actress in performances at the National Theatre, the State Theatre of Northern Greece, the Municipal Theatre of Piraeus, the DIPETHE of Veria, the Athens Festival, the Alternative Stage of the Hellenic Greek Theatre, etc.

 

DIMITRIOS CHATZITHEODOSIOU

Theatre Director (MFA, MBA, MPAM(c), MA(c), BBA) /

Postgraduate student, Department of Theatre Studies NKUA

 

He is a four-time postgraduate student at The Department of Theatre Studies NKUA. He specialized in Performance Art and its application in large organizations' human resources, with qualifications from the University of Bolton, UK. Ηe has also expertise in performing arts management and stage direction from Politecnico di Milano in collaboration with Accademia Scala Milano and Piccolo Teatro. He holds a degree from the School of Drama, Faculty of Fine Arts (AUTH), and studied Economics, Business Administration, Strategy, and Marketing at the Institute Universitaire Kurt Bosh, Switzerland. His interests include large language models, neural networks, machine learning, AI in theatre and performing arts, creative writing, poetry, and contemporary directing techniques. He is the founder and president of the Cultural Association of Theatre and Art DEUSKOUROS PHOENIX, producing art and research in theatre, performance, film, and art through AI. He is a professional theatre director.