Still there (Lunch at aunt Tasia's house)

2007

Lingri

An improvised Cypriot version of cricket, which is much more fun and needs no equipment... I am wondering if the game is older than the colonial period... I couldn't find anything on the web, but the following text, which describes a simplified version of the game: "There are several versions of this game, with the payers agreeing before-hand on the way the game is to be played and on the "punishement" of the losers. One version is as follows:
The "lingri" - a piece of wood about 30 cm long and 3cm in diameter - is placed on two vertical slabs - the "niskia" - which are 15cm apart. The first player tries to knock the "lingri" into the air by striking it with the "lingra", "verka" or "lingroverka" which is a stick about 65-70cm long; before the "lingra" fails to the ground the player tries to knock it into the air again and hurl it as far as possible; then he runs to where the "lingri" has fallen and strikes it again with the stick trying to knock it into the air and again to hurl it as far as possible. The player who manages to hit the "lingri" the furthest is the winner." saurce

Remains - Easter Bonfire

ARCO Calatlogue

I have been very busy lately and didn't find the time to post lots of things I wanted to. I will try to do so with some articles and publications. Here is some pages from ARCO solo show with Rodeo curated by Vasif Kortun. Texts by Vasif Kortun and Sylvia Kouvalis.







Christodoulos Panayiotou’s work has hovered between different themes and ideas, each time expressed in various forms and media. His “works are performance-based and collectively span every level of what one could describe as a spectrum of the performative in art– from, creating a space for activities such as dancing, directing actors and events, to the recording and tracing of both the artist’s and society’s ‘performances’ ” (APT).

Originally coming from dance and choreography Panayiotou’s work is based on research and his performance-related works require peculiar social involvement. In “Sunday” confetti was collected by workers of the municipality of Limassol and later pilled up in the gallery (2005); “Slow Dance Marathon” (2005) is an on-going series of public slow-dancing days organized in different cities with voluntary participants and his latest “GUYSGOCRAZY” (2007) an audited pornographic orgy was initiated and then filmed by Panayiotou with elevated pre and post moments of the hour-long event.

His work is best perceived in chapters and one of the most striking is “Absence”. It was originally conceived as a single work where the artist invited four intellectuals each representing one of the four main disciplines of Oxford University to discuss ‘absence’. The solo presentation in Arco’ 08 will be formed around this theme.

Sylvia Kouvali

This is not Greece

Δελτίο Τύπου - Παγκύπρια Πρωτοβουλία για τον Πολιτισμό

Πραγματοποιήθηκε την Πέμπτη 17 Απριλίου 2008, στο Κέντρο Τεχνών του Ιδρύματος «Πανίκος Μαυρέλλης», στη Λεμεσό, μια πρώτη ανοικτή συγκέντρωση ατόμων των γραμμάτων, των τεχνών και εκπροσώπων πολιτιστικών φορέων, για συζήτηση της σκοπούμενης ανέγερσης Μεγάρου Πολιτισμού, την οποία προωθεί το λεγόμενο «Ίδρυμα Κυπριακού Πολιτισμού».

Κατά τη συγκέντρωση καθολική υπήρξε η διαπίστωση ότι η ανέγερση ενός τέτοιου μεγαλεπήβολου Μεγάρου με προϋπολογιζόμενο κόστος ύψους, τουλάχιστον 100 εκατομμυρίων ευρώ ΔΕΝ πρέπει να αποτελεί και δεν αποτελεί αυτή τη στιγμή την άμεση και αναγκαία προτεραιότητα για συμπλήρωση ή αναβάθμιση της, ελλιπέστατης βασικής πολιτιστικής υποδομής της χώρας μας, (που σύμφωνα και με πρόσφατη ευρωπαϊκή έρευνα προκύπτει ότι η Κύπρος είναι προτελευταία πριν από την Ελλάδα σε έργα πολιτισμού).
Τα επιχειρήματα των εκπροσώπων του Ιδρύματος καθώς και κάποιων υποστηρικτών του μεγαλεπήβολου πλην όμως αμφίβολης αναγκαιότητας, αυτού εγχειρήματος ουδόλως πείθουν για την άμεση ανάγκη ανέγερσης ενός τέτοιου τεράστιου έργου, παρά μόνον ίσως για σκοπούς φιλοξενίας της τελετής έναρξης και των εκδηλώσεων στη διάρκεια της εξάμηνης προεδρίας της Ε.Ε. από την Κύπρο κατά το δεύτερο εξάμηνο του 2012 (όπως και επίσημα, ομολόγησε και ο Γενικός Διευθυντής του Ιδρύματος σε πρόσφατη συνεδρία της Κοινοβουλευτικής Επιτροπής Οικονομικών).

Αντίθετα, είναι πλέον του βέβαιου ότι το κράτος (πέραν της συμμετοχής του κατά 20% στο κόστος ανέγερσής του) θα κληθεί, αργά ή γρήγορα, να αναλάβει επιπρόσθετα (και μόνιμα) και τα δυσβάστακτα τεράστια έξοδα καθημερινής διαχείρισής και λειτουργίας του.
Τυχόν υλοποίηση της ανέγερσης και λειτουργίας του Μεγάρου θα οδηγήσει μετά πάσης βεβαιότητας προς συντήρηση του, στην διοχέτευση του συνόλου πιθανόν των κονδυλίων για την πολιτισμική ανάπτυξη και δημιουργία του τόπου μας. Κι αυτό για ένα, μοναδικό και αμφίβολης προτεραιότητας έργο για το οποίο, σημειωτέον, πραγματοποιείται χωρίς να προηγηθεί οποιαδήποτε μελέτη βιωσιμότητας μέσα μάλιστα σε συνθήκες πλήρους αδιαφάνειας και στο οποίο οι κύπριοι δημιουργοί θα αδυνατούν να λειτουργούν.
Οι υπόλοιπες ανάγκες για ισομερή και δίκαιη υλοποίηση πολιτιστικών υποδομών σε όλες της τέχνες και σε όλη την Κύπρο για προγραμματισμένη συμπλήρωση των απαραίτητων Στεγών Πολιτισμού του τόπου θα πληγεί ανεπανόρθωτα. ( Π.χ. Αρχαιολογικά Μουσεία Κύπρου, Λεμεσού και Πάφου, Θεατρικό Μουσείο Κύπρου, Κρατική Πινακοθήκη, Θεατρική Στέγη ΘΟΚ, Στέγαση Κρατικής Ορχήστρας, Παττίχειο Θέατρο Λεμεσό, Θεατρική Αίθουσα στην Πάφο και Λάρνακα, Πολιτιστική Στέγη στην Ελεύθερη Αμμόχωστο , Στέγες Πολιτισμού στην ύπαιθρο και δεκάδες άλλα). Δυστυχώς η ιστορία θυμίζει την γνωστή παροιμία «φαΐ δεν είχαμε»...)

Η συγκέντρωση, με δεδομένη την πλατιά υποστήριξη που έχει ήδη εκδηλωθεί για πρωτοβουλία αντίδρασης στην σκοπούμενη ανέγερση Μεγάρου, αποφάσισε τη σύγκληση παγκύπριας ανοικτής συγκέντρωσης που θα πραγματοποιηθεί την ερχόμενη Τετάρτη 23/04/2008 και ώρα 7 μ.μ. στη Δημοσιογραφική Εστία της Ένωσης Συντακτών Κύπρου, Λεωφόρος ΡΙΚ 12 Αγλαντζιά, για ενημέρωση, ανταλλαγή απόψεων, προβληματισμό και λήψη αποφάσεων σχετικά με το υπό κατασκευή Μέγαρο Πολιτισμού.

Για επικοινωνία και εκδήλωση υποστήριξης των σκοπών της Πρωτοβουλίας οι ενδιαφερόμενοι μπορούν να επικοινωνούν :

Ηλεκτρονική διεύθυνση: p.p.politismou@gmail.com
Σελίδα στο Διαδίκτυο : http://pppolitismou.blogspot.com/

Από την Προσωρινή Επιτροπή
Λεμεσός, 19/04/2008

This is not Ankara

Tonight I went to the theater with Marios and listen to Mrs Alving saying for one more time:

"Ghosts. When I heard Regina and Oswald in there, it was just like seeing ghosts before my eyes. I am half inclined to think we are all ghosts, Mr. Manders. It is not only what we have inherited from our fathers and mothers that exists again in us, but all sorts of old dead ideas and all kinds of old dead beliefs and things of that kind. They are not actually alive in us; but there they are dormant, all the same, and we can never be rid of them. Whenever I take up a newspaper and read it, I fancy I see ghosts creeping between the lines. There must be ghosts all over the world. They must be as countless as the grains of the sands,
it seems to me. And we are so miserably afraid of the light, all of us." (Ghosts, Henrik Ibsen)

Albert

Tonight in Istanbul - Rodeo

17.04.08- 31.05.08

Preview: Wednesday 16 April 7-9 PM


Tamar Guimaraes
Christodoulos Panayiotou
Haris Epaminonda and Daniel Gustav Kramer
Adam Leech


Curated by Krist Gruijthuijsen and Sylvia Kouvali

Tamar Guimaraes
Listed Entries…
2006
Audio track, 16mm projector

In the early 19th century, Jan Leton was given as a gift to the bailiff of Skagen - a small village in the north of Denmark, at the height of Denmark’s involvement in the Americas. An entry on the church book recorded Leton’s death in 1827, referring to him as the bailiff’s servant. It is the only official document in which his presence in Denmark is marked in writing during his ‘lifetime’, he’s been mentioned periodically in local newspapers and local history accounts from 1877 onwards.
Listed Entries is an index, or a dictionary with missing letters, listing the disparate ways Jan Leton’s presence in Skagen has been formulated orally and in print, based on information collected from Skagen’s death register, newspaper articles catalogued in Skagen’s local history museum and oral accounts. It spans a period of 178 years, from 1827, the year of Leton’s death, to 2006.
The lists are organized alphabetically and chronologically, preventing the narrative from progressing horizontally. Sliced vertically, the narrative proceeds according to topic and chronology, repeating at the same point like a broken record or the return of a past coming back to haunt the present. These ‘archaeological cuts’ expose historical discrepancies according to period and zeitgeist. Layers of sedimentary time encoding the political consciousness of its moment, the dates at the end of each entry are the dates of publication for the books and newspaper from which information is gathered.

Christodoulos Panayiotou
Act 1: The Departure
2008
framed images, theatrical backdrops

The work unfolds several possibilities of synopsis for a theatre play, excluding its language or actors, by only displaying an old folded theatre backdrop, accompanied by its archival photo indicating what might be displayed. Act 1 reveals the beginning of a colonial journey, a work in progress that will be followed by “Act 2: The Island” and completed by the final, third act: The Glorious Return.

Haris Epaminonda and Daniel Gustav Kramer
The infinite Library (an insert)
2008
various media

To reassemble two different books in a manner that each second page of one
book would be put together with each second page of the other, would result
in two volumes of similar weight, though varying in content, both unique in
their totality. If every book was to be taken apart and then combined with
another, an infinite library of readable or unreadable volumes would emerge,
a constellation of non-identical books establishing variant new systems and
approximations through juxtaposition and replacement. Imagine that all books would be treated in such manner no book would be left untouched or unaltered. Dismantling and deconstructing all books would mean that their initial purpose and origin would be disturbed. There would be no categories; no science or fiction books, no religious
writings or educational texts, but one homogeneous volume of books containing
another kind of knowledge. The knowledge found in this library would be
vast and infinite, an 'omnium-gatherum' full of cross-references based on
chance and the theory of probability. The purpose of each book would
simply be in its very nature, to be a book, containing possibility. There
is no assurance that anything written in such book would be true, neither
false, as this condition of becoming would be inhuman and coincidental, the
authority coming from the book itself. Censorship would not exist as authorship
would no longer be valid.

Adam Leech
Money, lots of money
2008
DVD

For Money, lots of money, Leech constructed a character highly intelligent, paranoid, multifaceted and compulsive at the same time. Inspired on the notion of Autism,
an absurd dialogue between an interviewer and an interviewee formulate questions and answers between various “characters” that intermix and complement each other, therefore losing all sense of its purpose. In this way, the information becomes a performative act in itself.

Walking with my friend Andreas Angelidakis in Limassol

Andreas was visiting Cyprus and we past a nice weekend together in Limassol. We walked around and looked at buildings. Andreas likes to look at buildinga. Now he went back to Athens!


Two happy-together huts



Two sad lonely huts


And some shy trees

California - Larnaka (Christos is the winner)

Larnaca - California (to the galactic disco)

On the way to Kedares Village (Visiting the house of my great-grandfather)

Maybe 17

The Adagio Dance from the film The Hollywood Revue (1929)