REALITY FRAGMENTS, CHANCE ENCOUNTERS – MY NEIGHBOURHOOD IN VENICE | 2007

About This Project

This is an individual work of an artistic video lasting 45 ‘ approximately, a series of photographic and video recordings during my three-month stay in Venice, through the program Radar connecting Europe-Creative Human Lab in European Cities (2002-2004).  It was presented in the group exhibition Next & across curated by Panagiota Tzamourani and Yiannis Koufopoulos, in the alternative space “P” at Gazi, as well as in an old house in Galatsi at 10 Alamanas Street in Athens, on the theme of the Neighborhood. Mai-June ‘07

Words & key-terms: neighborhood, outsider, foreigner, stranger, tenant, wandering, ephemeral habitation

During my ephemeral habitation in Venice, I made several recordings. I videotaped and constantly photographed my daily journeys and wanderings through the labyrinth of the city in the Laguna, in its passages. I recorded moments of everyday life, beautiful and spontaneous moments of the city’s people, celebrations and gatherings of residents, tourists, working people and travelers. This experience of living in the neighborhoods of Venice, I tried to render by cutting and sewing together again the images that were imprinted in my emotional intelligence and memory.

Venice: The city of mystery and atmosphere, the city of spirits, the city that moves the city museum. Walking in this city I discover that is easy to be lost in such a labyrinth. After some dead ends to canals and rounds around the same places, somebody learns how to move in it. Lifestyle and people’s mentality here are so close to my heritage. Venetians gave part of their culture to the islands of Ionian Sea, one of which it’s my personal home country. The city is looking on you. She observes you. You have the feeling that the city observes you. It is then first time I have been to a place with such a strong atmosphere. The main mystery is the way the city is built. Water, on water… The city is a labyrinth. Moving in it you have the feeling you are moving on a floating board full of houses. They say this city is built on blood. I first felt astonished to realize in which level of human practical knowledge city’s builders had reached. A whole city standing on a swamp! What an invention! What kind of mentality does the influence of water creates? We all, who are coming from places surrounded by water, are able to express our familiarity with this place here. From my short living there I can tell this is one of the basic “underground”, subconscious ingredients of the city. Because the city has its one mentality, a city is always a self-standing organism. And as people have influence on her, the same does she to them.

Though both languages differ to each other, the sound of expressions and the rhythm sounds so familiar to my ears. On the other hand Mediterranean attitude is common for both, Greeks and Italians. Our mentality is influenced by the element of water. Water is giving an energy that gets into your system. The city has its own intelligence and is an autonomous organization. As we influence her, so she does in turn. These are the views of the city that make us admire it, to feel awe for it and the aesthetics of perfection, its beauty. Nevertheless, Venice is a city that dies, a city that belongs to another epoch and slowly collapses. What will give it to you to understand this is to start getting out of the role of a tourist, not to look at first glance to find all the “sights” and pleasures, to get out of the process of in demand of “superficial and institutionalized” history. So when someone begins to learn either the oldest or the most modern history of Venice, it certainly confirms that this city has been built with blood. Apart from the very important role played in the Crusades, and thus acquired the trophies-symbols that were built and its fame, all expropriated from other civilizations, after massacres and looting. One sees the port of Margera and the industrial zone and considers how many people have sacrificed themselves for the progress and development of this place. On the other hand, going to Mestre, one understands that it comes out of the fairytale world and enters into reality.