Urbanism for Dummies | Salon De vortex
About Salon De Vortex
The collective project Salon De Vortex presents and reveals works from visual arts, poetry and social political thinking, focusing on the developing independent art scene in 21st century Greece.
The project is run and fueled by: Yiannis Grigoriadis and Yiannis Isidorou.
Urbanism for Dummies
Salon De vortex, as CHEAPART Resident 2013, presented a series of exhibitions and events entitled Urbanism for Dummies, hosted in CHEAPART's space, an attempt to journey through the manifestations and intensities of the urban phenomenon.
Active intellectuals, writers, artists and poets, developed tactics of observation and recognition of facts and symptoms of the contemporary metropolis, within this volatile, complicated project in progress.
SDV researched and unriddled the mysteries of upcoming ignorance, of radicalism, of the intensified discontent and the seemingly inevitable alienation, with the intention to support art, poetry and thinking as the basic tools, for creatively traversing the mechanisms of urbanism.
The main issues on which SDV focuses are such as the Modern Utopia and the Post-modern cynicism. Re-describing as a method of appropriation of life. The Structured space and the Fragmented representation. The Political ground. The Unseen spots. Τhe desire for community.
At the core of Salon de Vortex 2013, are: Societe Realiste, George Papadatos, Nadia Kalara,Zissis Kotionis, Yiannis Grigoriadis, Yiannis Isidorou, Kostis Stafylakis, Thophilos Traboulis.
The following exhibitions and events were presented, in the context of Urbanism for Dummies by Salon De Vortex:
Rebuilding Dialectics (completed) [January 24 - February 16]
The key members of the group Salon De Vortex, Yiannis Grigoriadis and Yiannis Isidorou, are exhibiting their installation "Rebuilding Dialectics", an attempt to think historically on the present, in a time that is characterised primarily by oblivion.
Zissis Kotionis | Subversion, a Story of the Political Underground [February 21 - March 20]
"Subversion" is an installation by Zissis Kotionis is a document of a temporal monument dedicated to the unrealized explosion of Hotel «Grande Bretagne», on Christmas of 1944. The hotel was subverted by the communist resistance awaiting Churchill’ s official visit in Athens.
Collaborator: Aliki Samara
#7.1 Discussion: The return of the repression [March 1st] In the context of "Subversion, a Story of the Political Underground" by Zissis Kotionis
The events and facts are presented by historian Tasos Sakellaropoulos.
Invited guests to the conversation: Elias Marmaras, Thophilos Traboulis, Katerina Iliopoulou, Alexandros Kioupkiolis, Nikos Belavilas, Yianna Barkouta, Kostis Velonis, Nadia Kalara, Phoebe Giannisi, Ioanna Laliotou, Maria Topali.
Together with Zissis Kotionis, Salon De Vortex co-ordinates with Yiannis Grigoriadis & Yiannis Isidorou.
Campus Novel | Black Maria [April 4 - 27]
Black Maria is a scenic structure that reproduces devised realities inside a restricted, self-sufficient space, where "special" events are destined to take place. Black Maria as an allegory for phantasmagoria in its contemporary urban setting.
Campus Novel: Giannis Cheimonakis, Giannis Delagrammatikas, Foteini Palpana, Yiannis Sinioroglou, Ino Varvariti.
What I was almost deprived of | Kolectiva Omonoia [May 14 - June 8]
A series of events and activities by Kolectiva Omonoia at Salon De Vortex at CHEAPART, Embros Theater at Psyrri, and in intermediate locations.
Participating Artists: Nikos Arvanitis, Efi Giannopoiulou, Evdokia Delipetrou, Vassiliki Dimou/Christina Katsari, Dimitris Dokatzis, Eleni Kalara, Apostolos Karastergiou, Anna Lascari, Melina Markaki / Dimitris Baltas, Alexandros Mistriotis, Stavroula Mosouli, Mariela Nestora, Vassilis Noulas / Constandina Theodorou, Andreas Thomopoulos, Fani Sofologi, Panagiotis Stefos, Maria Tzanakou, Steriani Tzitsiloni, Theofilos Tramboulis, Myrto Xanthopoulou.
Curated by: Theofilos Tramboulis
Kostis Stafylakis | the "commons" and the exoticization of resistance | Talk [June 6]
This talk draws on examples from the exhibition "Exploring the boundaries of togetherness" (Amfissa 2012 The symptom projects) to examine the reaction of the art community (in Greece and elsewhere) to contemporary "social radicalism".
CASA Amalia [September 5 - 15]
An exhibition that attempts to document the reception of the other, specifically, the reception that the other reserves for me within my intimate space. Meaningly, a reversed hosting condition.
Participating artists: Panagiotis Voulgaris, Argyris Drolapas, Dimitra Ioannou, Maria Lianou, Eleni Lyra, Kostas Christopoulos, Alexandros Christophinis
Curated by: Apostolis Artinos
The Shape of Orders to Come | Société Réaliste and George Papadatos [September 24 - October 24]
A dual/collaborative exhibition, whose title references the famous, almost prophetic book by H.G. Wells, “The Shape of Things to Come” of 1933, that speculates on future events from 1933 until 2106 and the establishment of a global state. The paraphrase in “The Shape of Orders to Come” is dual interpretation of «orders» as a new political and economic world order and as commands, orders imposed by this new condition.
Nadia Kalara | Here We Are…Home At Last [October 31 - November 24]
An installation by Nadia Kalara that can be perceived as an intermedial, oversized plan for a built-in, transcendent city.
Economic Value [November 27 - December 27]
A bold comment on the continuously changing political, social and financial context in which economic values rapidly evolve.
Participating artists: Lanfranco Aceti, Artemis Potamianou, Giannis Grigoriadis.
Lecture by Irene Micha on "Security and the City, seeking a way out of the ideology of submissiveness / protection”.
Kostis Stafylakis | Fragile Overidentifications | Talk [December 6]
Talk focused on artist's practices on overidentification, in Greece and abroad.