Eksarhia Sqr., Athens, 15February 2013
Aghios Nikolaos, Crete, 8 August 2010
Athens Video Art Festival, 13 April 2008
Aghios Nikolaos, Crete 14 & 15 September 2006
Rhodes 22,27,28 August 2003
Artemis Orfanidou and
Tassos Karalias during the performance
(2013)
PRESS RELEASE
Cultural Municipal Organization of Aghios Nikolaos Wish You Luck film productions
7 September 2006
TO : Cultural journalists
SUBJECT : Video-theatrical performance “THE END OF THE
WORLD” in Aghios Nikolaos, Crete, within the frame of TOUCH 2006
Festival
The Cultural Municipal Organization of Aghios Nikolaos, Wish
You Luck Film Productions and Angelos Spartalis present the video-theatrical performance
“THE END OF THE WORLD”.
It is a video projection on a human body. In this way, the
body functions as a live projection screen that dances. The texts that are recited refer
to love, ecology and war. During the performance there is use of violent but poetic
language and the presentation of a new, so far unexplored way for man to narrate his
stories.
Within the frame of TOUCH 2006 Festival there will be
two performances:
- On Thursday 14 September, at midnight, in
‘PERIPOU’ multiplace
- On Friday 15 September, at 22:00 p.m., outside the Municipal Gallery
Each performance lasts for 30 minutes and admission is
free
Text, direction and digital effects: Angelos Spartalis /
Choreography: Rita Marnellou dance workshop / Performers: Rita Marnellou, Maria
Hatzifotinou / Narration: Iakovos Kamhis / Production: Wish You Luck Film Productions /
Production assistant: Cristy Mengou / Media sponsor: Lato FM 103.3
The performance was first presented in 2003, curated by
Poly Hatzimarkou, in Rhodes. This year’s version is modified specially for TOUCH 2006
Festival.
The following is a typical extract from the text of the
performance:
“The fascinating sight of the bombarding of a city
undoubtedly belongs to the crew of the aircraft. It is the reward of the crew along with
the medal, which is coloured, in contrast to the sight of bombarding, which is always
black-and-white.
The fascinating sight of the bombarding of a city is
black-and-white and noisy. It smells of Easter to the Greeks, and of barbecue to the
Americans.
The fascinating sight of the bombarding of a city
undoubtedly also belongs to our cinematographic memory. The cinema took away smell and
added fascination. The cinema gave each city its own musical background. Its own
bombarding symphony…”
In the photo: Angelos Spartalis, Rita
Marnellou, Manos Stefanidis and Odysseas Sgouros, after the end of the performance “The End of the World” in ‘PERIPOU’
multiplace, 14 September 2006, Aghios Nikolaos, Crete.
The End of the World is a really powerful performance. It is important for such
things to happen away from the centre, away from formalities, away from sponsors and
banks, all those who make our lives sadder and more difficult. Well done! A marrying of
painting and cinema, comics and body-art, in a work so dense that I have never seen its
like. Spartalis has got brains, spirit and a mood that is quite subversive. He is bound to
make more things, and it is very important that he lives amongst you, because this work is
not so much his own as it comes from all of you. For myself, I truly hope I will
experience similar moments with you again.
Manos Stefanidis
Art Historian, Lecturer, University of Athens
(addressing the audience after the end of the performance)
Introduction (2003)
Ôhe
last poem from Angelos Spartalis's trilogy "The end of the world"
is presented in three shows and at three different locations of the city of Rhodes! The
poem has been formed into a video-theatre performance, an alternative artistic proposal,
which enters unconventional sites considering the usual standards.
The first part,
titled "Shoes
Cemetery", was presented at cafe Besara and the bookstore "To
Dentro" in Rhodes, in August 2000: it was modified in a theatre performance, combined
with a slide projection of illustrations and texts.
The second part, titled "Round
is the River", has been staged at the courtyard of the Centre of
Contemporary Art of Rhodes, during the ending ceremony of the art project
"MoTeR1"(April 2001). An artificial, polygon-shaped greenhouse, was the peculiar
setting of the painting-theatre performance, on which 12 kg of color was thrown by
Spartalis. Two amateur actors were starring: Stergios Pardalos and Jacko Camchis.
At the show "The end of the world", Jacko Camchis (and
two more… invisible heroes) is narrating the poem, while there is a constant video
projection onto his body. That is an unconventional method of direction, which immobilizes
the viewer, as it bestows drama and an emotional charge. Spartalis, well-known from his
painting exhibitions (amongst others he participated at the art projects MoTeR1 & 2),
wrote "automatically" -influenced by T.S Elliot's "The Waste Land" and
F.G Lorca's "Poet in New York"- directed the show and created the video-art
piece.
All poems of the trilogy shift through the categories of love, politics and death.
For love:Sandy melancholic moments / Sun-burnt settings / By entering
your body / I silently failed to become you / Just like a tree silently fails to become a
cloud / By penetrating the cloud / In this way / I existed only / for kissing your foot…
(The end of the world, I, 53c-64c)
For politics:We muzzled many human opponents / For our voice to be
heard / With such passion and devotion / For so many years / Until the opponents
degenerated into a race of mutes by birth / Who now put on bunches of explosive materials
/ And blow themselves up in our homes / Dead by birth… (The
end of the world, VI, 142c-149c)
For death:I stroll / Days, years / Miles, miles / I walk across a shoes
cemetery // I am from another planet / To another planet / And you are elsewhere… (Shoes Cemetery, I, episode a', 20a-23a, 28a-30a)