Reflecting on Four Performances in the Public Space of Athens

Περίληψη

In this article I expound my work in public space through four performance pieces that I have presented over the last decade in several areas of Athens. I discuss these performances, focusing on the artist's experience and perspective regarding the underlying intentions, the methods employed, and the parameters that determine each piece. More specifically, the following works are studied:
Errants (Metaxourgeio, 2012): I invented a persona that would not trigger any sense of danger in those she encountered: a white, cisgender, well-dressed middle-class woman. She wandered the neighbourhood streets, dragging a wheeled suitcase behind her, looking for accommodation. The piece plays with the boundaries of the welcome or unwelcome stranger and attempts to intervene in the public sphere and to question issues such as racism and xenophobia.
Unneeded (Eleonas, 2018): In order to provide myself and others with an opportunity to release what they considered unnecessary and burdensome; I crafted a dress out of a plastic garbage bag. I wore this dress and along with the audience traced a long silent route in the Eleonas area after the Scavengers' Flea Market had been held. I asked people to leave whatever they deemed unnecessary on the dress. Arriving at Beton 7 gallery, I removed the dress and left it there, detached from all of us, as an exhibit.
Reconstruction (Lycabettus, 2020): This piece deals with the role of memory in constructing one's identity and the potential of actively intervening and altering it through the imprinting of photographs that depict moments of my personal life on my body. Ultimately, my body stood as an exhibit, a living and active archive, and the viewers bore witness to the intimate and transformative process that had taken place.
Pou edy mou to kallos (Lycabettus, 2022): It was a visual, abstract representation of Lili Zografou's novel of the same title. The text, the natural landscape, the performer's body, and the dress were the axes that narrated the book's story and defined the performance. The sensory stimuli of the natural environment contributed to the overall experience of the performance.
Analysing these works, I realise that three main elements permeate them: the active participation of the audience, the element of ritual and the healing function of performance. To conclude, I reflect on the impact on performer’s body, the fundamental role of space and time in public space performance, and the ‘here and now’ dimension of performance.