As part of the #OccupyAtopos program and on the occasion of the 200th anniversary of the Greek Revolution, the occupation by artist, historian and researcher, Alexis Fidetzis, continues in the neoclassical building on Salaminos Street in Metaxourgeio, which has been transformed into a Revolutionary Headquarters. Fidetzis, invited by the artistic director of ATOPOS cvc Vassilis Zidianakis, curates the second part of the #RevoltingBodies exhibition and presents works by 23 artists from Greece and abroad, while he again asks theorists to grace the project and present their work on the notion of revolution.

The works presented deal with the revolutionary fantasy and the institutional methods of dealing with the past. They flirt with the subjectivity of the concepts of good and evil, and converse with approaches that negotiate the ways in which state mechanisms retell the stories of revolutions and impose them on future generations as formative national myths. As in the first part of the exhibition, the bodies involved in revolutionary histories play a significant role in these artistic formulations. Through their stories we can even see the way in which some historical subjects are hidden from the revolutionary narratives while others are transformed into the heroes that national mythology uses for centuries to come. The construction and reformulation of symbols is, after all, a structural element of the revolutionary fiction, whether they are elements of clothing, banners or the historical individuals.

Participanting artists:

Nikos Arvanitis

Anastasia Douka

Anietie Ekanem

Eva Giannakopoulou & Persefoni Myrtsou

Marina Gioti

Alicia Grullon

Alexandros Kaklamanos

Dionysis Kavallieratos

Eleftheria Kotzaki

Aristidis Lappas

Lara Nasser

Nazanin Noroozi

Dimitris Papachristos

Ilias Papailiakis

Nefeli Papadimouli

Shahpour Pouyan

Eva Stefani

Sasha Streshna

Theo Triantafyllidis

Maria Varela

Vangelis Vlachos

Michalis Zacharias

Michailangelos Vlassis-Ziakas

Curation: Alexis Fidetzis

#RevoltingBodies attempts to integrate the Greek revolution in the context of a broader dialogue about the revolutionary phenomenon that dominated the modern world, delving into the stories of the bodies on which the revolutionary fiction and action is written. The study of the history of these bodies is the field in which the artistic discourse will reposition the revolution. Through the historical, anthropological and artistic approach on the body one can diagnose the methods of turning the individual into a hero and also the structure of the revolutionary narrative as an integral support of each national construct.

During the winter and until the end of the exhibition in February, the Speech and Image Headquarters of ATOPOS cvc also organizes a series of activities such as performances, lectures, tours and podcasts where various aspects of the history of revolutions are presented to the general public. The podcasts, the research and all the individual actions of the project, can be seen digitally on the website revoltingdodies.gr.

EXHIBITION II / Duration: December 8 2021 – February 18, 2022

Days & Hours:

Wednesday: 16:00 – 20:00

Thursday & Friday: 12:00 – 18:00

and selected Saturdays & Sundays: 12:00 – 16:00 (for December 11, 18, 19/12)

BOOK TIMED TICKETS

Free entrance, registration is required as there is a limited number of visitors allowed (up to 8 visitors per hour)

AlexisFidetzis was born in Athens where he currently resides and works. He studied painting at the Athens School of Fine Arts (ASFA) and the Munich Kunstakademie while he got his MFA at the Pratt Institute in New York where he focused on research-based artistic practices. He is currently completing his second Master’s Degree in Modern Greek history at the School of Philosophy at the University of Athens. He is also a doctoral candidate at ASFA. Fidetzis uses historical research as a means of artistic creation in an effort to diagnose current social, cultural, and political issues. He is interested in the institutional management of collective social trauma alongside the ways in which power structures shape our common past.

#OccupyAtopos is the artist residency programme of ATOPOS cvc. The main focus of the program is on interdisciplinary research and the study of contemporary visual culture of the human body. It will emphasize the embodied experience and the narrated character of the gendered and racialized body, personal and collective trauma, memory, systems of embodied cognition, as well as the relationship between the body, social justice, and ecology. Its mission is to observe and support the creative process of emerging artists, designers, curators and thinkers. The word ‘atopos’, from the ancient Greek word ”ἄτοπος”, means out of space and out of the way and refers to that which is strange, unwonted, eccentric and disgusting, but also to the foul and the unclassifiable.

Special thanks to ARCAthens (Artist Residency Center Athens)

The program is organized with the support of the Hellenic Ministry of Culture and Sports.

* for the duration of this program, the physical space of ATOPOS at Salaminos Street 72, Metaxourgeio, will be operating in accordance with the government’s precautionary measures against COVID-19.

*Disabled Access is currently possible to the Ground Floor only by ramp.