Academy of Choreography U(R)TOPIAS: Open Sharing

A unique action by the Academy of Choreography U(R)TOPIAS, as part of 2023 ΕΛΕVΣΙΣ European Capital of Culture, will take place on Saturday, July 2, and Sunday, July 3, at the X-Bowling Art Center. 13 young choreographers present their artistic works in progress, which draw inspiration from the history, heritage and memory of the city of Elefsina, its industrial past and its architectural wealth, as well as from themes such as the female worker, the natural and the marine environment.

The main goal of the U(R)TOPIAS AcademyofChoreography, under the artistic direction of Patricia Apergi, is to create a distinct activity in the field of dance, to support young and emerging choreographers and to cultivate a new audience for dance, focusing on the city of Elefsina. Starting in the fall of 2021, the young choreographers who participated in the programme were the following: Eleftheria Agapaki, Eleni Vasilonikolou, Maria Garefi, Christiana Kosiari, Martha Kotsia, Stella Mastorosteriou, Giorgos Papadopoulos, Ivi Riga, Elian Roumie, Emmanuela Sakellari, Katerina Foti, Diamanto Hadjizacharia, Lea Simonsmeier. They got to know the city of Elefsina and attended a series of creative workshops with renowned choreographers and arts professionals from Greece and abroad: Patricia Apergi, Nadja Argyropoulou, Tasos Vrettos, Evangelia Therianou, Dimitris Kamarotos, Angeliki Lampiri, Michail Marmarinos, Sofia Mavragani, Chrysanthi Badeka, Konstantinos Sakkas, Froso Troussa, Steriani Tsintziloni, Anastasia Tsopelaki, Christos Christopoulos, Willi Dorner, Lisi Estaras, Roberto Fratini Serafide, Victor Leclere, Carmen Mehnert, Mathilde Monnier.

Mystery 59

Academy of Choreography U(R)TOPIAS
Program
Open Sharing_Day 1

Bouboulina’s

“Bouboulina’s” is a live rehearsal on stage, by a choreographer and a performer, a mother and a daughter. The audience will watch the rehearsal as if looking through a keyhole at the two women getting ready, setting up their set, talking, performing movements, making mistakes, having intimate moments. The present work, performed by an old woman, as a representative of all the workers who were once called Bouboulinas because of their dynamism, is based on the original video dance “Bouboulina.” The repeated movements in the factories of Elefsina were the trigger for its composition.

Idea/Concept: Christiana Kosiari

Performers /Co-creators of matieral: Maria-Aggela Kosiari Katsikali, Christiana Kosiari

Music: Jan Van D’Engel

Special thanks for the interviews to the following: Evangelia Nodara, Anna Tsopelaki, Litsa Tsanakaki, Chrysoula Skorda

Special thanks: Konstantinos Tzathas

Dealing with Fireworks

Explosions can be catastrophic, or they can give birth to wonderful things. Through the story of the workers of Elefsina and the environment of the PYRKAL factory, the project attempts to create a metaphor inspired by the process of producing explosives and the dangerous working conditions of the factory. In a world of an environment of explosions, its people manage to survive, to build their society together, to raise their voices and create their own nuclei. A world that feeds off the explosions and finds a way to exist.

Concept/Choreogaphy: Emmanuela Sakellari

Music: The Second Waltz (Dmitri Shostakovich) –  André Rieu

Performers: Iris Liakakou, Archontia Boulouta, Emmanuela Sakellari, Lea Simonsmeier

Artistic collaborators: Eleftheria Agapaki, Angelos Kyriou

The false reality of standing still

The false reality of standing still presents exactly what its title suggests—the illusion of stillness. It draws inspiration from the old factory buildings of Elefsina that have been abandoned for years, surrendered to the wear and tear they are subjected to on a daily basis, and treats them as living organisms that constantly change and transform their form. The work depicts this reality through the human body and invites the audience to recognize the constant change that occurs around and within us, even when everything is seemingly still.

Choreography/Performance: Diamanto Hadjizacharia

Music: LCD Soundsystem

Many thanks to all the participants of the Choreography Academy and to Maria Papageorgiou for her valuable help.

REMNANTS

As the individual’s behaviour is shaped—and shapes—by social, class, gender and increasingly more contexts, the dichotomy between the “natural/instinctual” and the “artificial” begins to be distorted. We are the remnants of this synthesis. The boundaries between spontaneity and compulsion are merging.

In a similar reading of the areas of Elefsina, the Refineries and Aspropyrgos, as remnants of a metropolis, the current landscape consists of a mixture of the natural and the artificial/industrial.

Can we talk about these landscapes as we talk about our bodies?

Shots of a car traveler-passenger and the performance of exploring the relationship between “physical and nonphysical” processes seek to answer the question: “What remains?”

Choreography/Direction, Video/Performance:

Martha Kotsia

Set design: Georgina Choleva

Music: tsev

Videographers: Artemis Konstantinou, Katerina Markoulaki

3D Mapping: Vassiliki Rouvali

Many thanks to: Iordanis Doulakis, Nicole Kotsia and Niki Soubasi

What Is Left

What lies beneath the surface of the water? What is left in the sea of Elefsina?  A visitor approaches the city underwater and ends up in the area of Vlycha, opening up a different path to the coastal area of the city. All the stimuli, images and sounds that she takes in while in the “Ship Graveyard” have obvious effects on her breathing, functionality and mobility, and the more she engages with the environment she discovers, the more uncomfortable she feels. What is she ultimately trying to accomplish? To regain her breath or to react?

Concept/Choreography: Maria Garefi

Performance: Marianna Leptokaropoulou

Music Composition: Panagiotis Tsakiris

Thanks: Throdoris Kouneles, Georgia Fragou

enTrance

Inspired by the Eleusinian Mysteries, the project traces the beginning of a journey focusing on the prevalence of life and reconciliation with death. It is a procession that goes through the experience of the deterioration of the body, with the aim of tuning into that pulsating field where the limits of individuality are transcended and existence is intertwined with non-existence. In this field, every end is but a new beginning, as long as you take the first step.

Choreography: Eleftheria Agapaki

Dancers: Loukas Theodosopoulos, Konstantina Liontiou, Rea Tsantouri, Petros Tsofillas

Music: Vrodex

OFFERINGS

Offerings is a study of the finds of the archaeological site of Elefsina. We approach the votive offerings as autonomous objects, i.e. by removing the mythological and historical information they carry and study them around three parameters: Their material—the marble, the gesture of the figures represented in them and finally the fragmented state in which they are found, which intensifies the ambiguity of their interpretation.

Choreography: Stella Mastorosteriou

Dancers: Sofia Apostolidou, Ioanna Palamidous

Music: Irama Gema

Video recording: Kyriakos Apostolidis

Open Sharing_Day 2

Begegnungen-Skizzen (Meetings-Sketches)

Listen. Listen openly, carefully. Don’t just use your ears… and you will hear the memories of a childhood in Elefsina. Memories that come from a long time ago. Like flashes from the past.

Imagine that past. Where do the memories travel in your mind and heart?

Where could we be if we learned to listen?

Memories of: Vangelis Liggos, Petros Lazarou, Evangelia Nontara and Thodoris Kouneles.

Concept/Choreography/Performace: Lea Simonsmeier

Video: Diamanto Hadjizacharia

Special thanks to Patricia Apergi, Christos Christopoulos, Anastasia Tsopelaki, Emmanuella Sakellari, Grigoris Panopoulos

Dead spring

The work is based on the following question: “How have human beings lost themselves throught he development of industry and technology?”

The title comes from the idea that, in today’s world, spring is no longer experienced in the same natural way that it would have been in the past, before all of this technological development was created. That is, we don’t experience it as a rebirth but merely as another weather phenomenon without substance.

Humans were once one with nature. They experienced rebirth and death, not with despair, but with the “wisdom” of being aware of the “endless” cycle of life.

Separated from their very nature, human beings lose their own nature. Thus, they feel they are living an “unlivable life” and end up in a meaningless life!

Concept/Choreography/Performance: Giorgos Papadopoulos

Coalesce

Coalesce is a perpetual simile/allegory. Through the prism of catalytic turning points of the city, from the beginning of its history to the current development of Elefsina, the choreographer wishes to address issues of power that have affected the place and its people. By using images and micro illusions, she simultaneously takes a dive into the critical points in each of them and into an inner journey of formation, alteration, dissolution, empowerment and recognition.

Choreography: Ivi Riga

Dancers: Amalia Tzanetaki, Ivi Riga

Μουσική: Υvonne Sadji Sembene

Thanks: Maria Penesi, Petros Apsomotos, Υvonne Sadji Sembene

The Kitchen Dance

Is there a place where leisure and work coexist in a delicate balance?

Working on the exploration of leisure time through its gendered reading and coming into contact, during the research, with women from the cultural associations of Elefsina who identify leisure time with collective dance, I concluded that this place is none other than the kitchen.

The kitchen, perfectly identified with women’s domestic work, is also a nuclear meeting place, the center of the home. The kitchen can be a prison of endless manual labor, a family hearth, a place of worship, a meeting place and a place of celebration.

Concept/Choreography/Performance: Katerina Foti

“Outside Eye”/Video Recording & Editing: Tassos Gkoletsos

Special Thanks: Panagiotis Gavrelas, Eirini Georgalaki, Erifili Giannakopoulou, Ilektra Ellinikioti – Kamiros, Dimitris Kalantzis, Nikos Sevastopoulos and, of course, the U(R)TOPIAS team, Patricia Apergi / Aerites Modern Dance Group and 2023 Eleusis for the artistic support and trust.

fikie

OR a deep dive trippy dreamy escape underwater surface dive die φύκι die gorgons hanging with a fish at the bottom of the sea experience.

The basic concept of the research revolves around the idea of constant transformation.  The aim of the project is to create a microcosm that lives mysteriously hidden beneath the surface of the sea.  Free to constantly change forms and survive through this change.

This world lives just outside the center of Elefsina. In a ship graveyard there is life, an entire universe, and hardly anyone knows of its existence. A world of beautiful ugliness, a world of mermaids and monsters, a world that captures the imagination and attempts to transcend it.

Concept/Choreography: Eleni Vasilonikolou

Performers/Co-creators:  Ilektra Vossou, Eleni Voultsidou, Fotoula Gerakianaki, Eleni Moustaka

Stage design: Anna Biza

Costume design: athene vintage

Music: Fruto 5, mum, Cristian Vogel, Count the money, Lullatone

“Outside Eye”: Charitini Galanopoulou

Special thanks: Aristea Vlachou, Athina Ziazopoulou, Thanassis Koumboulis

25km

The idea of 25km is inspired by the Eleusinian Mysteries and specifically by one of the most important events of the Mysteries, that of the ancient procession that started from Athens and ended in the Ceremonial Hall of Elefsina. Through the long journey of the Sacred Way we walked with the group in silence for 25 kilometers. We tried to follow the ancient route respectfully, while discovering new paths that led us to Elefsina. We made rest stops near important monuments associated with the procession and composed site-specific artistic rituals inspired by the content of the Eleusinian Mysteries and the immersive landscapes offered by the route. The final destination of the 25km project is the proposal of a new Eleusinian procession based on the ancient and contemporary history of the place along with the human body’s need to (re)live in the now.

Concept – Choreogaphy: Elian Roumie

Performance: Zoi Efstathiou, Nancy Nerantzi, Lea Simonsmeier, Elian Roumie

Dramatic advice: Rodia Vomvolou

Video Recording – Editing: Konstantinos Kalavrezos

Graphic design: Anna Pipili