First Postcard from the Athenians

[imomus]

I don't think I was expecting much of "Destroy Athens", the city's first art biennial. But I actually thought it -- and the ReMap stuff going on around it -- was terrific. There was some great Scandinavian video art. My favourite piece (by a British-sounding artist whose name I couldn't find) was a video history of an eccentric, hand-built Greek house with an authoritative-sounding narrative based on the hunches of a spirit medium. Offsite, I also liked the shabby-funky office building occupied by Peres Projects and the Edinburgh artists' show Young Athenians (Edinburgh is "the Athens of the North"). And it was fun to find Pablo de la Barra kipping on the ground in his gallery kitchen, having a siesta.



The main biennial show at the Gasi (an abandoned gas works as impressive, with its guages and pipes and occasional gassy smell, as the art itself) made a nicer story, Hisae and I found, if you traversed it backwards. The curators linked the various buildings by means of blackened wood corridors which led you from local to global and from optimistic to rather grim. So we did the journey backwards, entering at the grim, global end and ending at the local beginning (which had a big room of Chris Marker videos made in collaboration with a group of Greek artists).

When a guard approached to reprimand me for going the wrong way, I said "We're destroying the Athens curators' narrative!"

"All right then," she said, and waved me on.

Comments

[dzima.livejournal.com]

Momus, would you please drop by Crete and tell NicePimmel to undelete his journal. We've been all apprehensive and fraught since this happened.

[microworlds.livejournal.com]

I forgot that you were in Athens! Weird since I ate at an Athenian grill near my college. I was wondering what it reminded me of, and then I read this entry and it all came together. I was also listening to Tender Pervert so it should have clicked, but it didn't. I guess I was too worried about my Art History class!

[lord-whimsy.livejournal.com]

Listening to Tender Pervert with a mouthful of goat. My, but we are getting an education!

[microworlds.livejournal.com]

You bring up an interesting point!

And it was a great alternative to not eating at my favorite Greek restaurant in Ventura. At least the waiters weren't staring at me lustfully this time!

[lord-whimsy.livejournal.com]

Those weren't waiters--they were satyrs!

I'm so old, I'd even be grateful for a hairy Greek man's leer (you'd think with my facial hair I might be mistaken for a goat now and then).

I say enjoy your ripeness, missy--all our peaches become cobbler in the end!

[microworlds.livejournal.com]

Satyrs, who serve food on the side!

And you're right, I *should* enjoy it while I still can, although I never do get the attention I want. It's either old men driving past me and whistling, or men my age that don't shower and insist that they're super intelligent because they have a "hueg vokabulari."

Although I kind of find it hilarious when I do get that kind of attention.

[lord-whimsy.livejournal.com]

I usually get attention from this sort:

[microworlds.livejournal.com]

I'm a little confused. Deranged transsexuals are attracted to you, or Jehovah's Witnesses? I have a few solutions to getting rid of missionaries coming to your door (obviously I can't do this with Mormon missionaries):
1) strip naked and answer the door (it would work a lot better if you had an erection)
2) Smear ketchup all over your face and press your face up to the window if there's a window next to the door
3) rewire your doorbell so that instead of just a default ring, the ringer gets a satanic message thrown at them

Also, the ending creeped me out a bit because the music in the last few seconds was the ending music for a common children's Mormon church song called "I Am a Child of God." That reminds me, I need to film myself singing Mormon campfire songs soon.

[lord-whimsy.livejournal.com]

Deranged drag queens, mostly. I'm in decline, you see.

[microworlds.livejournal.com]

Oh, what a shame! I've always imagined you with an equally fabulous and intelligent mate, drinking wine in an over stocked personal library. I guess that's not the case in this situation!

[lord-whimsy.livejournal.com]

Well it is like that, actually--but my wife gets similar attention from lesbians.

[microworlds.livejournal.com]

Wow, I didn't know you were married! I guess the saying is true: you learn something new every day. I can't say that about my classes today, though. My English teacher makes me feel like I've regressed to my first high school English class. Example: "How does this passage make you feel?" while we were talking about writing a proper thesis statement.

[mandyrose.livejournal.com]

Well, as my mother always says, "Who looks at me? I'm married."

[microworlds.livejournal.com]

Actually, the music playing throughout is "I Am a Child of God." I guess I must have tuned it out! ~*Selective memory*~

[iampixiedust.livejournal.com]

Left an old red Fiat in Athens. If you find it, you can sell it for scrap metal. It will be the one covered in a centimetre of dust.

[violet-hemlock.livejournal.com]

sounds great. If only we could walk the ruins of every city in such a delightful way. Athens looks like its emerging, while kinda staying the same. Interesting.

and Pablo Leon de la Barra!!! I love it!

[imomus.livejournal.com]

[cap-scaleman.livejournal.com]

The colours! I like it when you paint at the wall and on the ground.

Chris Marker is a

[(Anonymous)]

filmaker I most undoubtedly would like to follow more than it is actually possible. So, what were the kind of videos shown of his at the biennal?
Which group of athens?



Alex P.

Re: Chris Marker is a

[imomus.livejournal.com]

"One of the most interesting works is a project by the British Otolith Group which reframes and presents a series of television series on Greece’s cultural heritage (interviews with intellectuals such as Michel Serres, Cornelius Castoriadis, Michel Serres and Iannis Xenakis appear) made by the French filmmaker Chris Marker in 1989. (The series was produced by the Onassis Foundation which, according to the exhibition’s catalog, found the material insulting to Greek identity. As a result, the documentary was not widely distributed.)" source (http://www.ekathimerini.com/4dcgi/news/civ__3301468KathiLev&xml/&aspKath/civ.asp?fdate=12/09/2007)

[petit-paradis.livejournal.com]

what a lovely little lily van der stokker (-like?) piece.

ask

[(Anonymous)]

Pablo León de la Barra? or just Pablo de la Barra?

Re: ask

[imomus.livejournal.com]

Pablo León de la Barra.

[idealforcolors.livejournal.com]

Whoa! I just got to Athens today, so weird to be scrolling past the pictures and then think, "Wait, that looks familiar...."