The Palm-Tree Kiosk: Exhibition based on the archive of Phivos Stavrides Foundation - Larnaca Archives

Press Release, December - 2021

Based on the archive of Phivos Stavrides Foundation - Larnaca Archives, the exhibition “The Palm-Tree Kiosk” brings together historical objects, photographs, posters, emblems and postcards bearing the palm-tree as their thematic axis - the tree that has marked Larnaca as a physical entity and as a symbol of social and local identity. Set up in the form of aninstallation, the viewer can visit a touristic kiosk, like those located along and in parallel to the Finikoudes Promenade. The archival evidence is exhibited in open dialogue with new artworks - contemporary postcards, a peculiar form of communication that combines the speakers’ public message with a unique and iconic image. The two-dimensional and touristic depiction of the palm-tree is presented on reused product display stands, whilst the tree’s multiplicity unfolds in a context of historical references and aesthetic portrayals, related to the person that planted it and lives with it.

Exhibition duration: December 2021 - February 2022 

Artists: Giorgos Gerontides, Evros Evriviades, Hope (Konstantinos Ntagkas), Theopisti Stylianou-Lambert, Iosif Hadjikyriakos, Katerina Scoufaridou, PASHIAS, Filep Motwary, Hourig Torossian

Curation: PASHIAS, Iosif Hadjikyriakos

* The exhibition is accompanied by the publication “The Palm-Tree Post-Cards” featuring texts and postcards from the Foundation’s archive and by the participating artists.

* Sponsor: Cultural Services - Min. of Education & Culture / Co-organiser: Youth Makerspace Larnaka / Supporters: METRO Supermarkets, Kypros Economides Enterprises Ltd.

* Phivos Stavrides Foundation - Larnaca Archives / 1 Zinonos Kitieos Street, 6023, Larnaca

Did you become a palm-tree?: A conversation about research project "I've made you a palm-tree"

By PASHIAS (P) + Iosif Hadjikyriakos (I)

I: When I think of how it begun and the result, even if it’s not rare to begin with archival material ending in an artistic proposal, it’s still very intriguing, how material that is deposited somewhere in the form of information translates into the ‘contemporary’ through the arts. Why, the palm-tree?

P: Why, the palm-tree? Firstly, I was lucky enough to meet you in 2018 and you are indeed, as a person or as a building, having an institutional dimension, that of Phivos Stavrides Foundation, situated in the parallel street to Finikoudes. The palm-trees are synonymous to today’s, former and future Larnaca, they will remain as such. I can see it, I can identify it, it’s next to you and I think of it as synonymous to Larnaca. For myself, PASHIAS, as a child, as a being located in Cyprus, the palm-tree is important, since from a young age I noticed it, I saw it, I observed it, it made an impression on me. Firstly, its physical appearance, and secondly, its multiplicity in meaning, as a symbol, as an image, as a notion. Hence, I wanted to discover all of these dimensions and you helped me to do so.

I: What interests me is that, beyond the discovery, this discovery helped in raising questions related to the palm-tree as being, as shape, as notion, symbolic notion. Is it easy to achieve a distance from the palm-tree’s idea through the process of studying and creating artworks, in the way that they ‘happened’ in time, as it is three and a half years of work?

P: I think that we began with the palm-tree’s shape and idea as our work’s main parameters, for all of us, especially in the first exhibition that took place in December of 2020 at Former Hondos Centre, in the centre of Nicosia, since through the artworks or through your words, from both images and texts, you could always see the palm-tree’s shape and idea as the main characteristic. I believe that we achieved a distance from this shape and idea, in the live performance artwork “DAME” in collaboration with Buffer Fringe Festival, in which I’m literally placed, planted and buried next to the palm-tree and, simultaneously, I converse with it, at the same time and also in another time and another place.

I: Detached. You’re now detached from the palm-tree. I believe that in the first exhibition, the palm-tree was still the identifier, as the identifying element of a social being, as a symbol, still identified with PASHIAS, through the wallpaper and also through the statue, the large life-size statue of yourself becoming a palm-tree. The detachment took place when you were placed in front of the palm-tree, buried as a palm-tree, but you weren’t a palm-tree. Therefore, an important element of change, of growth, I think you wouldn’t be able to do so if we didn’t have the time imposed by the pandemic.

P: I believe that the pandemic has shaped the course of this work in its entirety, since firstly, the pandemic’s practical requirements, the distance, the different time, the ways of constructing an artwork with all its difficulties, have surely shaped the way in which we approached the palm-tree and its contemporaneity, as we are working, presenting and conversing ‘now’, with references to the past, looking towards the future. Hence, we chose the parameters of a vitrine, in a shut down and empty commercial space, placing artwork in the form of product for consumption, for viewing, imposing a sense of distance to the viewer. On the other hand, in the live artwork “DAME” we are inviting viewers to a parking lot, and vice versa, the viewer is placed behind glass, taking the position previously occupied by the artwork, and we are presenting in the form of a public exhibition, with the dangers or joys of exposure, as the body is now vulnerably placed in the centre.

I: I think that this is exactly the difference and the condition’s interest, it’s about the condition. In the first exhibition we had the condition of enclosure in terms of a box, not being able to touch the objects - artworks inside, in the performance we had the condition of viewers being enclosed in a box, whilst, fil rouge, the condition of commercializing the artwork is connected with the latest chapter of the project, in the form of an exhibition hosted in our space today. It’s still in the form of an artwork that can be consumed, but it enters a context that doesn’t bear the form of a closed box, both the viewer and the object are open boxes that can connect. In this case, we add an element that was missing before, the starting point from which we began, the archival material. Kiosk. Why, the kiosk?                   

P: Why, the kiosk? Reaching the end of research program “I’ve made you a palm-tree”, I can see that we made many choices related to public space, public exposure and the public. What is sharing? Something that we share, something that belongs to all of us. Hence, the use of public space that should belong to all of us. The kiosk, the parking lot, the vitrine, the shop are all different forms of public space, each with its own limitations. Therefore, the act of visiting a place in the form of a kiosk, relates to the notion of the ‘ephemeral’, a notion that is in conversation with and in contrast to the palm-tree, often presented as something permanent. It’s planted firmly, sometimes it becomes sick, sometimes you may cut it on purpose, yet its presence usually defines the urban and public landscape, whilst the tree also creates space, time and images for the civilian to identify with, to forget or strongly remember, as the one that has planted it and lives with it.

I: To an extent the same happens with a kiosk. It’s a reference point, it’s a service point, it’s a meeting point, opposite the kiosk, after the kiosk to the right, it’s a reference point in the same way that a palm-tree exists on our cities’ horizon.

P: Both the palm-tree and the kiosk characterize the area in which we are currently located, they are next to, around, in parallel to the Phivos Stavrides Foundation. You can position the archival material, the artwork, the new artworks created by the invited artists, opening up the field of creation in order to have more views and dimensions of the palm-tree, still in the form of a consumable product, as seen in the vitrine products and as seen in the ephemerality of a parking lot visit. Hence, everything is connected in a way that we are just now understanding, with the program’s ending.

I: This is very intriguing. The intriguing idea of how we entered, how we allowed ourselves to be free and go with the process’ flow, without trying to give answers at frequent time intervals, but at these time intervals we observed our process and we presented it in diverse ways to the audience. I think that regarding the kiosk, the nature of the archive’s majority in the form of postcards, assisted the co-existence of the artworks and the archival material, alongside the idea of the kiosk. As a matter of fact, most of our stands are stands for postcards.

P: We, our selves, found these stands. I view the kiosk promotion stands as part of the archive and as part of the artwork. They have their own historicity, they have been collected, they have been cleaned by us, we took care of them and now they belong to the archive of Phivos Stavrides Foundation.

I: At the same time, they assist in transforming the exhibition into one artwork. The stands alongside the archival material and the contemporary artworks assist in transforming the exhibition into one piece, as the closing chapter of our research program that begun in 2018.

P: For yourself, our publication, the booklet “The Palm-Tree Post-Cards”, what was your intention for the viewers who got it, who took it home? What would you like to remain with them? 

I: Through the publication, I wanted us to give to the viewer the ability to emotionally connect with the material. Beyond the texts that someone can write, someone can read, the sensation that you can take home a piece of the archival material and a piece of the exhibited contemporary artworks, belonging to you, you can take it for free, do whatever you want with it, since they can be cut and they can be used as real postcards. Hence, this idea, this sensation makes the viewer, the owner, part of our process. Emotionally you can enter into our research program, you become, unknowingly, part of the research program. What is provoked by reading and using our booklet is part of our research.

P: With this project’s ending, after three and a half or four years, has the way in which you view a palm-tree in front you changed? What were you thinking, what was the image in your mind when you saw it four years ago in comparison to now? What has changed?

I: It would be very easy to say that I have reached a saturation point, a feeling that we both share. There’s a palm-tree over there, oh my God! Yet, I was always interested in the identification of Finikoudes with this city, in the subjective nature of this identification’s historicity, its newness, dating back to 1919-20, identifying the city with the palm-tree, the Phoenicians, the ancient kingdom of Kition, Larnaca. It has always been part of my interest topics.

P: So, it’s not that new.

I: It’s not that new, it has just been enriched with our project, I think that my sense of the palm-tree has been simply enriched. You know what’s intriguing? I already had the palm-tree ‘disease’, but I can see people that have visited our exhibitions, our acts of expression, also catching this ‘disease’. They are sending us photographs of palm-trees, they are calling to say that they have seen a really beautiful palm-tree somewhere. Something that really impressed me in this experience, is that you identified the palm-tree with a peacock. How did this come about? They have an obvious relationship, but I want you to tell me how did it come about.

P: I think it begun with the clever finding for the title of the overall research program “I’ve made you a palm-tree”, a clear and raw translation of the Cypriot idiom. It bears a materiality, I thought of the materiality in this phrase, how can I practically make you into a palm-tree, to transform you into a palm-tree. I’m also fond of the English translation, I made you one palm-tree, I’ve made you a palm-tree, and again, I made you into palm-tree. Thinking of our tendency as a nation to be attached onto our image, we like to show off what is grand, striking, colourful, in the same manner a peacock does, yet at the same time, we are not so involved with the essence, we don’t give the time and space to understand someone else, a situation or a condition. Hence, the ritualistic finding of the peacock, opening up its colourful feathers to provoke and to invite a partner, can be paralleled to the palm-tree’s explosiveness, also translated into other kinds of explosions, as seen in the fireworks used in the live artwork “DAME”, the green smoke talking about a celebration, as it is often used in football matches, talking about a protest, as it is often seen in demonstration meetings. It’s also my own necessity to shout out “I’m here”, maybe to shout to myself that “I’m here”, what am I doing? Now, today, here, at this point. Hence, now, I can see the connection between everything and all parts of this research will stay with me, regardless of reaching a saturation point as you previously mentioned. Do you know how I feel when I look at the palm-tree now? It may sound a bit weird, it’s as if I’m looking at a silent comrade, I can’t describe it in another way. I don’t converse with it anymore, I have already thought of it, I’ve seen and touched it, we have a history together, I just feel that we are comrades. I’m also rooted here, as an artist and as a human being, I have a tendency of escapism, a tendency of explosion, I can somehow be dangerous, at the same time I can be familiar.

I: You define a landscape.

P: Yes, I feel that we have so many common characteristics, I feel that we silently co-exist, and when I walk and I see a palm-tree I feel a sense of security.

I: Hence, this question comes naturally. If, after the program’s completion, you feel that I’ve made you a palm-tree?

P: You made me into palm-tree?

I: If you feel that you became a palm-tree. Do you feel so? Did you become a palm-tree?

DAME: Here, but where?

By Dr. Iosif Hadjikyriakos

Through the research program “I’ve made you a palm-tree”, visual artist PASHIAS explores symbolisms that belong to the palm-tree, identifying it with the human social dimension. Image and dimension become the essence of the human being’s nature, desiring and seeking a dialogue with its equals. The dialogue’s only purpose is to establish hierarchy, social differentiation and stratification. In December of 2020, during the pandemic’s initial recovery, PASHIAS alongside his collaborators, decided to publish the first results of their socio-artistic research based on the archival evidence housed by the Phivos Stavrides Foundation - Larnaca Archives. He selected the empty shell of a commercial department store in the center of Nicosia, to situate his first creative thoughts in the form of products posing in Christmas shop windows. The public communion of the artist’s thoughts took form as a resonating protest, full of irony and questions. To what extent are we free in our expressions? To what extent are we restricted by social conditions in our unfolding? To what extent can the palm-tree act freely and independently of its natural context? Notions, such as personal and national identity, the act of flaunting, aesthetic exaggeration, presented on purpose in their most superficial dimension, in order to provoke reflections behind the shop window’s glass. The artist does not provide answers, he questions and poses questions to himself and to the audience.

The department store presentation was designed as a follow-up to PASHIAS’ live performance artwork in the context of Buffer Fringe Festival, that was planned for November of the same year. The epidemiologic situation and the protocols of the Republic of Cyprus prevented its completion. Following the principle of time’s subjectivity, the postponed happenings were planned for the year 2021. Thus, we are now here, δαμέ (dame) according to the Cypriot idiom and according to the title. Without a doubt, the tense and peculiar period that we went through, still defines our trajectory, also defining the reconstruction, the readjustment or the development of this new performance artwork. Its form remains the same, yet the essence of its intention has been changing: the palm-tree, as a symbol of the social being, transforms into a symbolic mirror of introspection. The researcher - artist dives into the depths of his consciousness, in order to free himself of the social constructs that he identified and exhibited in the previous year. Only then, can he concentrate on his essence, on his wider and deeper Ego, free of third parties.

Today, here, PASHIAS states and manifests his intentions and choices, as he always does, yet today and here, these intentions and choices primarily concern himself. The experience of his past has led him to focus on a vertical dialogue with himself, a vertical line that connects him with the earth, in which he has been planted, and with the sky, to which he tends to. Horizontal relations, with the space and with the audience, are absent. He chooses to become a mark on the ground, he situates the only tangible material, the body, on a vertical axis, extending his center upwards and downwards. As a result, he cancels both the past and the present: the mark is not only geographical, the here is simultaneously now, the slightest and the eternal, just as human presence. Through its introspection, the human being reacts, protests, explodes, in the form of intention, necessity, but not in the form of provocation. By employing the palm-tree reference, the artist’s trunk is rooted in common ground and in public view, stating his intention to protest through the green cloak of smoke, not in the form of ostentatious palm-tree leaves, but in the form of the creator’s aethereal anger. Anger, discontent, grief, an act of protest. Protesting about what and at whom. Towards all that he has accomplished to shed off from the palm-tree as social being. The structures, the Authorities, the proper behaviors and the improper impositions. The rigid impasse towards any direction. Immobilizing and confining the earthily dimension, in parallel to the spirit’s explosion.

Δαμέ. Here, but where? The spot is located at and is surrounded by a public space for parking cars in the center of Old Town Nicosia. A surrounding environment where vehicles are temporarily stored. A common space that can also be a private one, when its usage is no longer dedicated to storing and when it transforms into an interpersonal space in between people wanting to publicly negotiate, almost anonymously, often illegally. Through its public dimension, the parking lot provides the absolute security of impersonal presence. This is a condition that the artist has chosen to attribute to his audience, keeping for himself the condition of absolute public exposure. He emphasizes and transfers the social dimension of the palm-tree to audience members, positioning them in the form of wheeled creatures that surround him, without affecting him. Automobiles constitute the habitat naturale of the speeding human being, at the same time, the emblems of its social flaunting and, simultaneously, the shells of its private safety. The protest’s critique is transported onto the viewer, observing the artist’s activity at a safe distance and position. They are watching, but they can choose not to participate, as the protest’s witnesses.

The artwork’s purpose is achieved through the ephemeral green vandalization of the atmosphere. The force of stillness and the tension of explosiveness transform the artist into an axis. It is up to the vehicles to follow its direction. 

I've made you a palm-tree: 24/7 Exhibition by PASHIAS in collaboration with Iosif Hadjikyriakos & Katerina Skoufaridou

Press Release, December - 2020

The exhibition “I’ve made you a palm-tree” takes place this December and January, in the form of an urban intervention at former Hondos Centre (20 Zenas Kanther Street, opposite Paul Restaurant) in Nicosia's commercial centre. Activating the building's facade, the passerby-viewer can access all exhibits from the sidewalk, during the whole day and night, according to their own time and spatial comfort, as the only open and functioning exhibition in Cyprus at the moment, due to newly implemented measures against the pandemic.

By identifying the establishment of the palm-tree as a staple feature of Cyprus’ urban landscape and as an integral part of our cultural identity, the exhibition “I’ve made you a palm-tree” locates historically the seed’s arrival to the island, emphasizing its connection to the person that planted it and lived with it. A tall and sturdy column rooted into soil, defying the horizon with its vertical outreach, opening up towards the sky into an ‘eruption’ of long and sharp needle-like leaves.

Visual artist PASHIAS collaborates with art historian Iosif Hadjikyriakos (Phivos Stavrides Foundation - Larnaca Archives) and architect Katerina Scoufaridou (Emblem Gallery), presenting a multidisciplinary approach to the palm-tree, as an emblem of mobility and displacement of cultural ideals within an open field of chronological and geographical origin. From the relations of the ancient kingdom of Kition to the Phoenicians, the island’s connection to Egypt and the region of Mesopotamia, the rise of the Ottoman Empire, to the modernization of costal fronts according to international trade models.

The seed's travel and spread presents itself through diverse perspectives of spatial placement or social perception, exploring the sense of 'belonging' in relation to current sociopolitical conditions. Through the practice of photography, installation, graphic design and writing, the human body, as primary material for creation, is ‘planted’ in parallel to the palm-tree, as a symbol that appears to be local and familiar, simultaneously foreign and exotic.

Exhibition duration: December 2020 - Aprin 2021 / Open for the whole day & night

* Former Hondos Centre, 20 Zenas Kanther Street, Opposite Paul Restaurant, Nicosia

…in as much as we are a plant not of an earthly but of a heavenly growth, raises us from earth to our kindred who are in heaven. And in this we say truly; for the divine power suspended the head and root of us from that place where the generation of the soul first began, and thus made the whole body upright. - Plato, Timaeus, 90 a-b

By Dr. Iosif Hadjikyriakos

What is the nature of a human being and who is the human being in nature, which nature. In Greek, the word human (άνθρωπος - anthropos) denotes the being that is able to move upwards. Trees have the same tendency. Usually, one nourishes the other, both nourished by the soil and the sky, grow and bear fruit, and in the end, die. What is the difference between the two and what condition defines their relation. To which degree the tree becomes humanized and how much of a tree can a human become.

Physical and symbolic dimensions often combine, giving birth to monsters, hybrids like the man-eating trees of the Alps, the oracle trees, the “Homo arbor inversa” of Renaissance, the Mandragora of alchemists and of Machiavelli, Daphne and Narcissus. Fruits of the mind’s imagination, the language of symbols provides endless lists of trees and plants that mean one or the other, according to time and place.

Through archival research, PASHIAS explores the presence of the palm-tree in the geographical and social setting of Cyprus, documenting the values and conditions that characterize it. Building up the material housed at the Phivos Stavrides Foundation - Larnaca Archives, the researcher collected black and white memories on yellow paper, postcards combining landscapes from Egypt and Cyprus, posters and touristic advertisements, images, objects, phrases and customs that charged the artist until he transformed into a pareidolia of the tree.

Exotic and yet so local, the palm-tree characterizes mainly the urban landscapes of the island and states an identity that many of us would refuse. It screams about the East and explodes like a frozen green firework. Brought to Cyprus by the Phoenicians; Phoenicians and palm-trees (φοίνικες - phoinikes) in the city of Kition that became the 20th century’s Larnaca by importing their exotic transatlantic sisters from Côte d'Azur. Leaves like fingers and leaves like palms, lick the sky and determine the tempo of our daily routine. A compliment places us at the top and we often live with the hope of never falling off. Unintentionally, the tree was connected with social uplift, the applause of the many. Its peak became the Ithaca of our vanity and its trunk transformed into the prison of our expectations.

The human - palm - tree gets trapped in its effort to grow, stands still, buried in the soil, part of the urban landscape in an unspecified area, a yard of another era conquered by private transport vehicles. These constitute small palm-trees, since through them we measure our social status. Cars are our mobile private spaces; through them we are called to watch a happening. After all, this is how we are accustomed to experience nature, through our vehicles, similar to snails or turtles. And because the human has an upwards tendency, he can’t be removed from his explosive Ego. Planted in earth, he continues to protest, asking for help in his situation, and in ours. Releasing a smoke bomb in order to reach the palm’s mane, he asks of the wind to bring a prophecy blowing favorably to the right. Thus, he becomes the mute scream of the captive social being, an emblem for the human who wants to be and to be seen, in order to balance upon the limits of the social horizon.

The palm - tree becomes fashion and runs across all costal fronts and hotels, it becomes an identity and colours the domestic yards in which it keeps growing. The palm - human becomes the concept and method of PASHIAS’ expressive design and presents itself as a visual performance artwork, elsewhere as an intervention - exhibition, continuing in more facets through time and space.

The PASHIAS: 6-step Artist’s Workout Guide

Press Release, April - 2020 

In the epoch of quarantine and self-isolation, visual artist PASHIAS proposes the homonymous five-minute video “The PASHIAS” - a set of physical exercises. “6-step Artist’s Workout Guide” as stated in the video, under the sound of a gong announcing its initiation. “Based upon his performance art practice, PASHIAS shares with you an exclusive set of body + mind training tasks, to keep you in fit shape + sharp focus.” Following the extended production of home workout videos that overwhelms social media platforms, the artist appropriates - cleverly and with humor - the format and aesthetic qualities of digitized communication means, inviting audiences to mimic images and gestures that characterize his recent practice. The steps to be followed take reference from martial arts, the sports of archery, basketball and from scenes reminiscent of Olympic gymnastics. The body creatively acquires the abdominal ‘visuals’ in seconds, learns to construct a bow out of bull’s horns, finds the courage to transform into a shooting target and self-applauds in order to achieve the sentiment of ‘victory’. “The PASHIAS” technique attempts to connect the isolated viewers, minimizing the virtual distance between bodies and connecting them with ‘moments’ of creation and cultural activity.

The live performance artworks in the five-minute video are presented as the result of the series “Training for performance”, that took place between 2015 and 2017. Attempting to establish an active connection between the art of performance and the field of athleticism, PASHIAS focuses on the human body as an agent of energy, skill, aesthetic qualities and potentiality, as seen in the activity of sports. Through an examination of what it means to ‘compete’ and to ‘complete’ a specific aim, the body comes in contact with the self, the ‘other’ and the audience, questioning the boundaries that define its physical materiality and ideological shape as a social construct. In the series “Training for performance”, drawing references from the time of Greek antiquity to our present sociocultural context, the body ‘in action’ is presented as a political body that confirms, tests and disrupts the functioning of a social ensemble. PASHIAS creates an interdisciplinary sport based in countries all over the world, such as Greece, Cyprus, France, Sweden and Spain, presenting 11 live performances, exhibitions of photography artworks and the development of an educational methodology taking place as a series of workshops, in collaboration with cultural institutions such as the Athens School of Fine Arts, Institut Supérieur des Beaux Arts de Besançon, Marina Abramović Institute, Benaki Museum, Verkstad Konsthall Gallery and SWAB International Art Fair.

On the floor: Live performance by visual artist PASHIAS + poet Daphne Nikita in conversation with works from the artistic practice of Michael Michaeledes 

Press Release, January - 2020

With reference to the temporary exhibition “I only ask for Light” at the Leventis Gallery, visual artist PASHIAS and poet Daphne Nikita present a live performance in conversation with works from the artistic practice of Michael Michaeledes, as a meeting path for creators from diverse means of expression. The work will take place at the Gallery on Wednesday 29^th of January at 20:30, with a duration of one hour and free entrance, whilst the exhibition has been curated by Dr. Eleni S. Nikita and Katerina Stephanidou. 

Michael Michaeledes’ (1923 - 2015) artistic journey has been specifically characterized by the creation of geometric stretch canvases, achieving international recognition by representing Greece in the Venice Biennale in 1976. Michaeledes architecturally defines visual space through his use of geometric shapes, shifting between flat and embossed surfaces, from two-dimensional to three-dimensional spaces. The viewer’s optic field is shaped by the recurrent use of white ‘color’ on the facade of his constructs, as the ultimate amalgamation of the color spectrum. Light takes the creator’s capacity, in order to allow for the function of shading to shape an image - as a poetic gesture - through the changing position of the viewer.

In live performance “On the floor”, the artist’s body becomes one with architecture’s horizontal axis, starting off from the flat dimension of the facade or the pediment, as elements often visualized in Michaelede’s work. The writing hand and voice of poet Daphne Nikita attribute - through her words - shape, volume and color to PASHIAS’ image, presenting the everlasting dialogue between ‘matter’ and ‘spirit’. The collaboration of Nikita and PASHIAS investigates the array of dimensions in contemporary creation, establishing a multidisciplinary approach to sculpture through performance art and poetry,  and inviting audience members to visit the historical artefact through a new ‘light’ of understanding.

* Claude Monet Room / Leventis Gallery / Anastasiou G. Leventi 5, 1097, Nicosia

Carry me home: Solo exhibition by visual artist PASHIAS 

Press Release, December - 2019

In his 5^th solo exhibition, visual artist PASHIAS proposes for the first time at Centre of Contemporary Art Diatopos, an ensemble of sculptures, videos and photographic artworks, opening on Friday the 6^th of December at 20:00, after 10 years of remarkable collaborations and presentations abroad. Achieving recognition through the art of performance and its establishment as ‘live creation’, PASHIAS transfers his public through the exhibition “Carry me home” to a place and time where each body’s presence still carries value, significance and weight.

Beginning with Greek mythology and moving into the practice of architecture, the artist explores bodies as structural elements for a building or providers of support for a construction. The act of equating bodies with pillars serves in creating an environment, where the relationship of a person and a social ensemble to which he/she belongs to, takes form in reference to the common ground they occupy and the common values they ‘carry’. The exhibition brings a dialogue of such cultural relations to the context of Cypriot reality, in order to observe its sociopolitical dynamics.

PASHIAS’ artworks take place in two-dimensions through paper and fabric, take on a three-dimensional form through marble, wood and plastic, and end up in moving image through video. The multiplicity of artistic proposal “Carry me home” presents itself as the transformation of mythological figures, architectural models and touristic depictions, in order to create contemporary ‘souvenirs’ or the memories of transferring and safekeeping bodies and values.

Exhibition opening: Friday 6 December 2019, 20:00

Exhibition duration: 7 - 21 December 2019 / Tuesday - Friday 17:00 - 19:30, Saturday 11:00 - 13:00

Curation: Daphne Nikita, Dimitris Venizelos, Melina Philippou

* Centre of Contemporary Art Diatopos / 11 DZ Crete Street, 1061, Nicosia

Space and the visual artwork in PASHIAS’ practice: Production + Relationality

By Dimitris Venizelos + Melina Philippou 

The production of meaning in performance art is inextricably related to place, (social) space and historic time, as parameters that foreground the performative act. Performance, which is the heart of PASHIAS’ artistic expression, can be viewed as a form of relational art performed within the sphere of human relations and their cultural context, rather than an autonomous private symbolic space. PASHIAS’ current exhibition entitled “Carry me home”, curated by Daphne Nikita, Dimitris Venizelos and Melina Philippou, introduces a new perspective to the artist’s work that refocuses the artistic experimentation less on performance as a lived experience and more on its formulations.

The communal character of PASHIAS’ art - both as performance and in its current form, as representations of the performative space - highlights the problematique of contemporary social relations. If the communal is understood here as a sense of responsibilty responsibility towards a ‘common’, or even, as a form of  dependency on this ‘common’, the exhibition investigates the environments that regulate the degree and the type of this responsibility and dependency through the analogy of gravitation; a ‘weight’ that has to be carried. And this starts from the exhibition space itself: in video artwork “Metaphora” the figure of the artist carries the upper floor of the gallery with all exhibited works included. This lifting of a collective weight by the artist opens the floor for the audience to act and occupy the space and be protected. In other instances where the notion of the ‘communal’ is connected to the economic and historical narratives and antagonisms of the Cypriot landscape, the artist identifies and exposes these tensions. In “Tall & Vertical” (Edmonton - Canada, 2019) documented as polaroid prints in artworks “Ceiling Studies #1-3”, artist and audience compete for the honour of assuming the symbolic weight of coronation; a coronation that is ambiguously presented as an analogy to the order of the Greek temple. The body performs as part of the structural system of beams and columns evoking the tradition of anthropomorphism in representations of the column. The placement of the human/column on a podium and its elevated posture anticipates the reactions of an audience compelled to rise to the occasion.

In the video artwork “The Burden” (Nicosia - Cyprus, 2009) which was exhibited in 2010 in PASHIAS’ first solo exhibition entitled “Neokapilos” and recently at the Cyprus pavilion of the 16^th Venice Biennale of Architecture, the artist’s body is inserted in the composition of “Memorial dedicated to the Missing”, a monument for the missing persons of the 1974 Turkish invasion, by sculptor Vasilis Kattos. As part of the sculpture and in solidarity with the maternal figures, the body stoicaly lifts the weight of the flame that gravitates more as a symbolic weight than as the actual force of the material substance. Similarly, in the sculpture “Aeras” the notion of ‘gravity’ is interpreted as the force of the ‘weight’ of thin air; the compelling weight of necessity that is as straightforward as the oxygen we breathe. The material and conceptual contradiction of an unbearable lightness, a light yet compellingly arduous ‘weight’, connects these works. Through the allegory of body as structural figure but also through an approach towards the visual artefact as ‘produced’ in situ by a dialectical relationship between artist, audience and the materiality that mediates this interaction, the artist proposes a series of spaces that approximate Bourriaud’s concept of ‘microtopias’: ‘provisional solutions in the here and now [by which the artist is] learning to inhabit the world in a better way’ (Bourriaud, 2001:13, 45; Bishop 2004:54). These ‘microtopias’ instrumentalize space to produce critical narratives for contemporary Cyprus.

The interpretation of the art form as socially ‘produced’ connects PASHIAS’ exhibition with contemporary critiques of space as architecture and as a concept in the social sciences. The architectural project is by nature  socially produced: a complex process of design and construction that involves multiple agents, but also a cultural practice that is imbued with meanings that often transcend or subvert the intentions of its designers. Beyond the strictly disciplinary factors that give architecture its meaning, the ways in which form operates through denotation, exemplification and metaphor, a building may also ‘mean’ something through ‘mediated reference’ (Goodman, 1988:33); the latter is way of signification produced by association to the historical, political and social conjuncture. From this perspective, the concept of the communal in PASHIAS’ work is defined on the one hand as ‘participation’, exemplified in his experimentations with the structural element of the pillar; and on the other hand - and crucially for this exhibition - as an aesthetic derived from the collective culture of the place and its value system; an aesthetic that becomes a critical tool as it oscillates between graveness, irony and humour. In “Ceiling Study #1”, an imitation of a classical frieze is lifted by the artist’s body which is positioned between replicas of Caryatids in the tourist resort of Kaya Artemis Casino, at the occupied village of Vokolida. The ‘weight’ of the frieze is compelling because of its ethical nature, and invites the audience to think about the ways space is produced in Cyprus in this particular historical moment. In this work, just like in “Ceiling Study #3” that depicts the ‘absent’ Caryatid exhibited in the British Museum, the act of dislocation and re-insertion in a new cultural context is investigated in its historical and political dimensions that transcend the properties of the artefact as a sculptural/architectural element. This requires an exploration of the complex ways by which global narratives are remoulded and negotiated by the social and political particularities of the context in the making of the postmodern landscape.  If the ‘weight’ of the pediment is merely a mirage, this raises questions of necessity and also highlights the urgency of deploying a critical lens that explores the political drivers behind the production of these spaces. The ethical ‘weight’, although lifted by the artist, falls upon each one of us and challeges our relation to the ethnic ‘other’ and to the landscape of this island that is alienated and turned into an a lanscape of the ‘other side’ amidst the decades-long bicommunal conflict. The lifting of weight is indicative of a shared responsibility for a space that is collectively produced. The notion of relational space has been the kernel of much social theory after the 1970s. Based on Leibniz, David Harvey (2006) defines relational space as ‘being contained in objects in the sense that an object can be said to exist only insofar as it contains and represents within itself relationships to other objects’. This ‘social space’, Henri Lefebvre (1991) writes, is the product of a triple dialectical relationship between spatial practices, representations of space and spaces of representations that correspond to the perceived, conceived and lived dimensions of space.

PASHIAS studies the spectrum of these social ‘material’ and political pressures in his reworking of mythological figures: the Atlas and the Caryatids, a dipole that permeates much of the artist’s work. Inspired by the Hellenistic sculpture of Farnese Atlas exhibited in the National Archaeological Museum in Napoli, “Floor Study #5” deploys the figure of the Atlas as a symbol of endurance that accepts his duty of forever carrying the world on his shoulders as a form of punishment. The posture of the body and the tension of muscles are indications of effort but also of perseverance. The Caryatids, on the other hand, are elegantly and effortlessly lifting the weight of the pediment, and contributing to the needs of the polis. This archetypal form serves as a precedent for the anthropomorphic pillars of artworks “Ensemble #1-3” that accept the honour to lift the weight and support the structure.  The duty of lifting the ‘weight’ oscillates between honour and punishment based on the personal history and conditionality of the subject.  The repetition of the sphere moreover, is an attempt to assign a form to the weight confronted by the figure; a weight that burdens the individual as seen in “Solo #1-3”, or that falls upon the shoulders of the entire community in all scales in “Maquette #1-3”.

In terms of methods, PASHIAS deploys photography as a medium that is able to convey the non-representational and embodied experience with the artwork. The polaroid, the souverir, the replica are elevated to objects of art with a highly critical capacity. Their political reading is made possible precisely through their relational aesthetic and through an alloy of graveness and irony that does not lend itself to utopian spaces, but lands the audience to the uncanny and the fleeting character of everyday life. Materials such as marble are contrasted to ‘artificial’ textures such as plastic, to induce this aesthetic impression, along with techniques of mass production, such as 3D scanning and printing that are used to make objects on display. This aesthetic of mass production that characterizes the objects of everyday life articulates a critique of space and place precisely because everyday life and ‘ordinary culture’ is still situated in the broader networks of power/knowledge, not least as they are imprinted on space (Latham 2003:1994). Beyond the spaces of consumerism, PASHIAS’ critique expands to questions of political identity and history vis-à-vis the communal character of Cyprus; it invites the audience to consider the ‘burden’, the responsibility and at the same time the honour of belonging to a place. PASHIAS’ works instumentalize the ‘light’ and the ‘frivolous’ of contemporary culture to explore the graveness and the ‘weight’ of responsibility towards a common space. Who carries this burden? And how does one share it? The notion of relationality that permeates artistic, urban, architectural and social understandings of space is the ground for PASHIAS’ current investigation and his decision to experiment with ‘object’ for the construction of critical narratives for the contemporary landscape.

References

Bishop, Claire. “Antagonism and Relational Aesthetics.” October, 2004, 51–79.

Bourriaud, Nicolas. Esthétique Relationelle. Les presses du réel, 2001.

Goodman, Nelson. “How Buildings Mean.” Critical Inquiry 11, no. 4 (1985): 642–653.

Harvey, David. Space as a Keyword. 2006.

———. The Condition of Postmodernity. Vol. 14. Blackwell Oxford, 1989.

Hunt, Mia A. “Urban Photography/Cultural Geography: Spaces, Objects, Events.” Geography Compass 8, no. 3 (2014): 151–168.

Latham, Alan. “Urbanity, Lifestyle and Making Sense of the New Urban Cultural Economy: Notes from Auckland, New Zealand.” Urban Studies 40, no. 9 (2003): 1699–1724.

Lefebvre, Henri. The Production of Space. Oxford Blackwell, 1991.

Rose, Gillian. “Visual Culture, Photography and the Urban: An Interpretive Framework.” Space and Culture, India 2, no. 3 (2014): 4–13.

Stanek, Łukasz. “Architecture as Space, Again? Notes on the’Spatial Turn’.” Le Journal Spéciale’Z, no. 4 (2012): 60.

Periphora: Live performance by visual artist PASHIAS

Press Release, September - 2019 

Returning to Cyprus with the new live performance “Periphora”, visual artist PASHIAS presents a study of the ‘line’ as a creative and conceptual tool. PASHIAS revisits the use of the ‘line’ in his previous work, to emphasize its capacity in defining a shape, in connecting or separating a set of units. By exploring the interactive dimension of performance art, the artist’s body comes in contact with an audience through the process of rotation, transforming the ‘line’ into a circle or surface and, as a result, into a system of communication.

“Periphora” takes place on Thursday 19^th of September from 20:00 until 22:00 at Theatro Polis - OPAP, presented as a result of residency program “BRIDGES” by artistic structure .pelma.Lia Haraki in collaboration with NiMAC (Nicosia Municipal Arts Centre - Pierides Foundation), in which PASHIAS took part during the months of June and September. During the live performance, viewers are welcome to enter and exit the space as many times as they wish.

The participation of PASHIAS in “BRIDGES” residency marks his first activity in Nicosia after the completion of performance “Mountaintop” in dialogue with selected artworks by historical figure Christoforos Savva, for International Museum Day 2018 at the State Gallery of Contemporary Cypriot Art. In 2019, the artist presented live works, lectures and workshops at Institut Supérieur des Beaux Arts de Besançon in France, international performance art festival “Trouble” in Belgium and the gallery Latitude53 in Canada.

* Theatro Polis - OPAP / Tempon 2, 1016, Nicosia

Periphora: The body as a sender + receiver of human relations

By Dr. Iosif Hadjikyriakos

Larnaca / 4^th September 2019 / Time 16:47

I’m considering words and images through the subjectivity of my thinking and my experiential consciousness. In any case, the artworks - happenings of PASHIAS directly connect the audience with the artistic act, offering the experience of creation as a common result, as a partnership, as a collaboration between the artist and the witness - viewer. In this context, my subjectivity becomes part of the artist’s work, whilst my thoughts and actions during the happening, become thoughts and actions of creation, corresponding and equal to the primary creator.

The immediacy offered by performance art and the active state it develops, transform the dimensions of space and time, into a result of the linear relationship between the artist and his audience. Space, time and line can be defined as the communication channels of PASHIAS in a continuous creative dialogue with the work’s witnesses. This triptych constitutes the structural essence of the course, the address and the direction of his work in recent years, “Vandalism #1” (Besançon - 2014), “Déforestation #1” (Toulouse - 2014), “Diagrama” (Athens - 2016) and “Lastwords” (Nicosia - 2017), are based on this principle. These four artworks - happenings are the examples selected by the artist as connecting threads of “Periphora” to his past, as he initiates the ritual process of creating his work, aiming to emphasize the line and his relation to the audience - witnesses - co-creators.

Always, he confronts his body as the core of creation, as a temple, the sanctuary of his spirit and as a reflected idol of the body and spirit of all people present. He chooses not to move from his initial position, but to revolve clockwise as a fixed point that follows the flow of time, collecting around it and on it, the behavior and relations developed in the space and time between people belonging to the same ensemble. People and their respective behavior revolve with coloured threads around the body - temple of PASHIAS, in order to reshape it, transferring upon it new social conditions of relations and situations that capture aspirations for the future.

As observed in the tradition of belting in folk practices, the work similarly follows the ritual of spontaneous expression ascribed to rope-tying around the central core of interest. For endless hours, the spindle spins a thread in the hands of youngsters, endless meters of yarn are dedicated to the temple for the belting that will save the community from drought and pestilence. The circulation of sacred artifacts always took place first before the belting. Alongside hymns and prayers, people’s aspirations were bound around the temple, weaving internally their hopes for the future.

As a spindle and a temple at the same time, the artist collects bundles of human aspiration and carries them on his body as ties, as keepsakes and as wishes, bringing art back to its cathartic dimension. In this way, PASHIAS designs and executes his artistic happening, transforming his body into sender and recipient of human relations alongside their deeper, more intimate, sentiments, leaving viewers with the possibility of intervening in his creation, and also in their own lives, through the ritual process of rope-tying.

How long does “Periphora” last and how many threads do we keep inside us?

What stays with us, as the ones that saw, thought and acted during “Periphora”?

What stays with the artist, as a result of our intervention? 

Mountaintop: Live performance by visual artist PASHIAS

Press Release, May - 2018

In the series of activities taking place on International Museum Day 2018 by the State Gallery of Contemporary Cypriot Art, visual artist PASHIAS presents the live performance “Mountaintop” on Saturday 19th of May at 20:15, commissioned by Cultural Services - Ministry of Education & Culture. The performance takes place in conversation with selected artworks by Christoforos Savva, marking the 50th anniversary of the historical artist’s death.

In continuation of his research on reconnecting historic exhibits and contemporary art forms, PASHIAS brings attention to artworks by Christoforos Savva, such as the tactile construction “Pyramid” (1968) with which he represented Cyprus in its first participation at the Venice Biennale. Savva shapes an artificial landscape through his use of nails, in which geometric formations construct a sharp sculptural surface or a ‘serious game’ of creation. Today, visual artist PASHIAS introduces his own body under this embossed surface, as a living tool for creation, requesting audience members to actively participate in reassembling a social ‘composition’ and the respective human relations that make it up.

* State Gallery of Contemporary Cypriot Art / Stasinos Avenue & 1 Kritis Street, 1060, Nicosia

Mountaintop: Performance for an artwork

By Daphne Nikita

The significance of art acquires an additional dimension when museum doors, in this instance those of the State Gallery, open up and invite young artists to engage in an interactive dialogue with the artworks, revealing aspects of their multiple significations.

Visual artist PASHIAS chooses the art of performance, turning his own body into a medium for creation and his actions into a live artwork. It’s not the first time PASHIAS has been invited to interact with museum artworks, creating through his practice, environments or situations that engage the viewer in a game of action and reaction. So far, he has successfully completed a series of performances in museums and exhibition spaces. He has initiated a dialogue with the artwork that creates a particularly interesting dynamic, formulating a link between past and present, while the body as live artwork coexists and interacts with the museum exhibit in present tense. Space-time, his own body, and his relationship with an audience are the principle features of the artist’s work in these museum settings.

In May 2014, the artist was invited to present the performance artwork “Déforestation #1” at the Musée des Augustins, in the framework of Toulouse International Art Festival, based on the sculpture “Philopeomen à Sellasie” (1829) by French sculptor Bernard Lange. In this performance, the artist cuts off grass from the museum garden, transposing it indoors within the exhibition space, and transforming it - alongside his body - into material for creating a live artwork that is in dialogue with the museum exhibits. The performance at the Cyprus State Gallery is in a sense the continuation of this use of materials.

Here, PASHIAS takes as a starting point the work of Christoforos Savva (1924-68). Savva is considered to be one of the most significant Cypriot artists of the 20th century. A creator who managed to transcend the borders of his native country, dared to travel and experiment with new media, materials, and techniques, opening up to new creative directions and gaining a prominent position in the history of modern Cypriot art. It comes as no surprise that PASHIAS, one of the most notable young Cypriot creators, selects Savva’s artworks to construct his own live, contemporary, interactive work - “Mountaintop”.

“Pyramid” - part of the first participation of Cyprus in the Venice Biennale, and “Circle” are the two pieces the artist interacts with. They both belong to Savva's latter pursuits, at a time when his research focused on the relationship of an artwork with space, light, and motion.  The result was a series of reliefs using pins, a game of shapes and forms that change according to the viewer's position and the direction of light. An elaborate game of imagination and invention, patiently placing pins on flat or embossed surfaces and creating geometric shapes, whose uneven planes are able to converse with light and shadows. This generated a movement en force, a swing in immobility, a play discreetly engaging the viewer in the world of art.

So, we follow PASHIAS in the hall with Savva’s pin reliefs. The game starts over, but this time in a different way. The works, in the same position for years now, lit by a fixed light and touched by time, have lost much of their former glow. The pins bear time on their surface, now capturing and reflecting the light with more difficulty. None of this helps to express the movement en force originally granted to the work by the artist. PASHIAS comes in to bring back this memory of movement. His body will converse with the artwork and function in space as a carrier of memory. Image one: The pyramid, and next to it the artist on the floor, having his body covered in green, this time synthetic, grass. Absolute immobility. Viewers take their place. A finger - like one of Savva’s nails - penetrates the green lawn. Movement succeeds immobility. The body reveals itself in slow motion, transforming into another work of art, gradually taking the shape of a pyramid - a peak - a mountain range, coexisting with Christoforos Savva’s museum pyramid before the eyes of the viewer. With the slightest movement and change of position, the body creates a new visual image in present space and time. Action turns into a poem, inviting audience members to participate in its composition, as the final artwork can only be completed through interaction. Only one red pin makes a difference in both of Savva’s works and in PASHIAS’ live creation. Museum art, visual artist and audience collaborate. To be continued, live.

Temple-boy: Solo exhibition, live performance + lecture series by visual artist PASHIAS

Press Release, December - 2017      

In collaboration with the Bank of Cyprus Cultural Foundation, visual artist PASHIAS presents the series of events “Temple-boy”, proposing the introduction of contemporary art forms into the foundation’s exhibitory framework. Contemporary expression visits and explores its ‘fundamental’ origin of creation, whilst the historic exhibit comes - again - in direct contact with human presence, defining its value as an ‘everlasting’ artifact.

Based on the archeological collection of George and Nefeli Giabra Pierides and through the establishment of the human body as basic material for creation, PASHIAS assumes the position of a limestone figurine from the series ‘temple boys’ - a valuable example of Cypriot sculptural expression originating from the 5^th century until the middle of 4^th century BC, documented as a possible offering to deities or keepsakes for rituals devoted to the successful passing of children from infancy to adulthood.

The arist’s body, situtated as a ‘servant’ to the museum, is placed at the questionable position of fulfiling the capacity of art - and in extension of an artist - to ‘entertain’ and ‘educate’ a social ensemble. The artwork “Temple-boy” - live performance and installation, attempts to initiate a process of offering, consumption, transformation and communication, exploring the museological responsibility to guard and preserve historical heritage, in terms of an individual and communal ability to ‘reassemble’ and ‘create’ anew.

Alongside the finissage of exhibition “Temple-boy”, the Bank of Cyprus Cultural Foundation presents the lecture “Body & Exhibit”. A nation’s cultural heritage consists of historical exhibits, as shaped by the human/creator, witnessing the social impact and conceptual characteristics implied by the modes of expressions at his/her disposal. Through a cultural institution’s capacity of safekeeping and displaying a historical archive, the ‘exhibit’ takes a distance from human presence - the creator and the user alike.

“Body & Exhibit” brings together esteemed speakers from diverse formats of expression, such as visual arts, photography, dance and architecture, investigating the impact of practices and specific artworks, bearing the historical exhibit as their central axis. The talk will be followed by an open discussion with the invited audience, and a tour of the exhibition “Temple-boy”.

Participants: PASHIAS (Visual Artist, Curator), Elizabeth Hoak-Doering (Visual Artist), Melina Philippou (Architect, Researcher for Future Heritage Lab / Massachusetts Institute of Technology), Demetris Venizelos (Architect, Researcher for University of Cyprus), Elena Stylianou (Assistant Professor, European University Cyprus), Artemis Eleftheriadou (Associate Professor, Frederick University), Elena Antoniou (Dance & Performance Artist)

Performance: Thursday 7 December, 20:30

Exhibition opening: Thursday 14 December 2017, 20:30

Exhibition duration: 15 December 2017 - 15 January 2018 / Monday - Sunday 10:00 - 19:00

Lecture: Thursday 11 January 2018, 19:30

* Bank of Cyprus Cultural Foundation / 86-90 Phaneromenis Street, 1011, Nicosia

Temple-boy: A description + critical reflection 

By Dr. Savvas Christodoulides

According to the concept of live performance “Temple-boy”, the body becomes a component of an exhibitory/museological condition: it can participate in an exhibition’s formulation, not only as a visitor, but as a living exhibit. It should be noted that for the setting up of PASHIAS’ activities, the reception hall of Bank of Cyprus Cultural Foundation has been chosen, right under the room hosting the archeological collection of George and Nefeli Giabra Pierides. The creator, in a similar manner as in his earlier activity at Musée des Augustins in Toulouse (2014), attempts to abolish the rigid relation of a body with the museological environment, by contributing to the exhibitory framework and by participating directly in it. Focusing on the unsettling of the visitor/exhibit relation, he inscribes his presence in the provided space by unfolding a process of ‘appearing’ and of ‘being’: exhibiting himself and in continuation acting upon it, only to confirm Paul Valéry’s suggestion that “it is nothing more nor less than the action of the whole human body; but an action transposed into a world”.

Having as an archetype the ‘servant to the museum’, a sitting limestone figurine (5th-4th century BC) of the Giabra collection, PASHIAS adopts a similar position. A position of being attentive, waiting, accepting, offering, but mainly a position of being exhibited. Holding in his hand a bunch of grapes, he develops a gesture that ‘undermines’ the body’s stillness. It is worth noting that the limestone figurines in question, usually hold spherical objects, a parameter that emphasizes their symbolic attributes. The representation of the Roman villa in Kato Paphos that showcases god Dionysus sitting opposite to the nymph Acme, holding a bunch of grapes, is directly related to the artist’s image in action.

In a first impression, it could be noted as a gesture of offering, but this condition is quickly dismantled. PASHIAS devotes himself to a practice of self-offering, since he consumes the fruit in his hands. According to the action’s concept, the grapes, through the ‘digestive route’, are transformed into solid transparent spheres. It becomes obvious that the process of consumption reads as a cleansing practice. At this point, it’s worth mentioning the words of French academic Pierre Boyancé (1900-76), stating that the soul is cleansed (in a Dionysiac manner) when it is forced into symbolic ‘ejections’ or discharges. By revealing in continuation the clear spheres from the back of his body, PASHIAS throws them towards the visitor’s side, attempt- ing to establish an imaginary yet binding line between himself and the audience. It could be noted as a state in which the creator adopts a mechanism of internalization, expulsion and projection of a ‘value’.

In continuation, the artist leaves the podium that he had occupied and approaches the visitors. He initiates a joint consumption of the red wine that had been offered to them before the action’s commencement. In some cases, he also removes the offered beverage, placing the glasses that contain it on the previously occupied basis. Here, the action’s ritualistic character expands into a conjunctive ‘communion’ that could be defined as the condition or parameter of a ‘relation’ in terms of manner, formulated as a synergy. He shares the glasses’ content with their holders. This communal experience (visual, gustatory, olfactory) confirms the conviction that the cosmic/artistic circumstance can only exist as an accumulation of relations between an individual and the ensemble.

In a first impression, it could be noted as a gesture of offering, but this condition is quickly dismantled. PASHIAS devotes himself to a practice of self-offering, since he consumes the fruit in his hands. According to the action’s concept, the grapes, through the ‘digestive route’, are transformed into solid transparent spheres. It becomes obvious that the process of consumption reads as a cleansing practice. At this point, it’s worth mentioning the words of French academic Pierre Boyancé (1900-76), stating that the soul is cleansed (in a Dionysiac manner) when it is forced into symbolic ‘ejections’ or discharges. By revealing in continuation the clear spheres from the back of his body, PASHIAS throws them towards the visitor’s side, attempting to establish an imaginary yet binding line between himself and the audience. It could be noted as a state in which the creator adopts a mechanism of internalization, expulsion and projection of a ‘value’.

In continuation, the artist leaves the podium that he had occupied and approaches the visitors. He initiates a joint consumption of the red wine that had been offered to them before the action’s commencement. In some cases, he also removes the offered beverage, placing the glasses that contain it on the previously occupied basis. Here, the action’s ritualistic character expands into a conjunctive ‘communion’ that could be defined as the condition or parameter of a ‘relation’ in terms of manner, formulated as a synergy. He shares the glasses’ content with their holders. This communal experience (visual, gustatory, olfactory) confirms the conviction that the cosmic/artistic circumstance can only exist as an accumulation of relations between an individual and the ensemble.

The action is completed with a gesture of discoloration or purification - as Goethe would have said - of the red wine. PASHIAS - by pouring a chemical substance into the wine that is left in the remaining glasses - achieves its ‘whitening’. It can be noted as a typical ritual that signals the action’s ending, also read as a process of purification. In the end, the creator removes himself from the space - the body in action turns into itself - leaving behind an area of artistic ‘happening’ with obvious signs of action, but also new elements, able to re-constitute his initial thought.

Temple-boy: Embodying Materialities

By Dr. Giorgos Papantoniou

Material culture should be seen as active and meaningfully constituted, and its meanings as governing everyday social relations, rather than passively reflecting them. Bourdieu tried to break dualisms such as nature : culture, social structure : individual agency, and individual : society, reminding us that humanity is physically embodied. Agency works through the body, and although embodiment is fundamental as a product of nature and a bearer of culture, it cannot be easily accommodated by these dualisms. The body is never mere corporeality, and thus it makes its appearance as expressive of social values, shared by participants, expressing power operating between people. Habitus is how people enter the world, staking a claim upon their place in the world, but also upon their identity. One should therefore consider how different bodies also experience and internalise power differently. Parameters, such as place on the social ladder, age and gender, would have shaped subjective experiences of material culture.

Material things, therefore, are integral components of ourselves, intimately linked to our social lives, thus actively shaping people and social relations. The embodiment presented in PASHIAS’ live performance “Temple-boy” opens a new interpretative window in approaching the materiality of these extraordinary pieces of ancient ‘art’, the meaning of which remains open and ‘subject to subjectivity’. ‘Objects’, like people, have agency, or at least, material objects are given meaning within agency. The characteristics of objects are important but what manifests social power is the dialectic between people and ‘things’. By addressing the locus of the body as a material grounding for subjective experience, but also as the objectification of moral values and bodily ideas, PASHIAS opens a new (quite personal) but enlightening contemporary experiential interpretation of ancient Cypriot ‘temple-boys’.

Temple-boy: Something Important Doesn’t Have to be Heavy

By Elizabeth Hoak-Doering

Understanding the museum as a temple is a critically dangerous place to start writing about a new work of art, but PASHIAS’ work, “Temple-boy” at the Bank of Cyprus Cultural Foundation has at its premise an ancient devotional sculpture, which is an artifact of the stony migration from temple to modern museum. His approach brings more attention to that trajectory, and modes of visiting and offering, than to any particular institution.

Cypriot ‘temple boys’, situated chronologically in the 5th century BC until the middle of 4th century BC, are clay or limestone sculptures, with a specific set of characteristics: they are chubby, dull-eyed boy-babies on the cusp of becoming boys, and they sit in a half lotus pose, draped, holding (or leaning on) temple offerings. Their genitals are also offered up (oddly) on the inner surface of the left ankle, which is tucked underneath them.

This last detail - about the acme of masculine vulnerability, displayed - is also the feature where these idiosyncratic Cypriot treasures can evince the fragile, transformative nature of performance art. Humor is essential here, and yet in “Temple-boy” the formal ideals that these sculptures embody parallel PASHIAS’ structured artistic research. That is, while an archaeologist may interpret a temple boy based on the semiotics of clothing style, cap, or hairdressing, the artist can go further. By taking on the sculptural idiom, PASHIAS enacts the gaps in meaning between offering and being offered, organic and abstract, dark and light. He reverses the Pygmalionic direction of stone-to-flesh by performatively undoing the structure of the votive sculpture, turning the timelessness expected of statuary into other, ephemeral images.

An installation follows the performance. Or, as PASHIAS puts it, ‘there is a museum collection, a body passes through it, and then there is another situation’. The exhibition of “Temple-boy” elucidates something about entropy in live performance and it brings awareness to the battle against decay and forgetting that is in the archaeological drive to preserve the past. Entropy is in the artist’s willingness to let impulse override planned actions, also. And it is in the ancient urge to beg the divine for a little more order, a little more time.