video-performance, duration 6: 44 min

This video performance was filmed in Hermes Areal at Halle an der Saale. I performed an action with the Butoh (Japanese contemporary dance) visualization of cigarette’s ash falling in the ground: the embodiment of an internal collapse. This location was chosen in base of its business of multiple directions of the traffic flow occurring simultaneously: I located myself in ”an urban island”.
I can imagine the roads being like rivers and the crossing of the cars as if they were the waves.
I have been working on the contrast between the figure that is monochromatic and quite still and the surrounding that is mixed with many colors and in continuous movement.
Why collapse ? This action condenses my feelings about the actual situation in Greece as well as in Europe.The economical crisis signs a very particular historical period that has to do with an inner need of a change. The crisis is not only economical, but more existential. Many questions arise such as how are we really treating the environment, are money worth so as to loose human lives, what is really happiness in an occidental society, how people can find an other meaning of their social being including the conviviality with the nature ?
A collapse is always connected with an upcoming birth which we can influence with our choices?

Site specific performance / Video-performance / Collaboration project
Concept and performance: Eleni Kolliopoulou
Sculpting project: Yiorgos Drosos

A pendulum never stops its movement … There are always regular intervals in the motion of the pendulum; it (the movement) is reloaded from its energy, it embodies transparent pauses, re launches and absorbs / processes the vibrations of its environment …
The space is manifested in contrast to the perpetual motion of the pendulum favouring the construction of a ring system that may have similarities to a magnetic field.
The location of the performance is a central pedestrian square of Athens. The performer moves with softness, regularity and tenderness between the living space that remains limited to a human being within the urban landscape.
The large sculpture “The Runner” created by the contemporary Varotsos emerges in the background.The strong impact of the statue which depicts a ‘man running in high speed merges with the figure moving slowly.
The fragility of the body of the performer acquires and reinforces its expression as it moves into and through the orchestrated aggression and hostility of the traffic flow.
This action gives the space perceived an imaginary tone. Viewers glide slowly in this liquid and dreamy state. This artificial situation opposes itself to the organic and liquid presence of the performer creating a rhythm among the functionality of everyday life of the contemporary city and the need to escape…