Greek Island I

GREEK ISLAND*

*code name of the secret bunker built for the members of the US Congress

The group art exhibition GREEK ISLAND* brings the spectators to a very central albeit secret spot of Athens and invites them to share a powerful emotional experience.

The walker, the downtown visitor may find himself in the air-raid shelter transformed into a military lock-up of the German Kommandantur, only if she/he is willing to briefly lose her/his way in the city and rediscover it anew.

Down here, at the two-story basement, one has the feeling that he/she walks into the subconscious of contemporary Greek history. The walled-in text of the space itself as well as the inscriptions on the rest of the surfaces transforms the place into a “magical notebook” where the lines that indefinitely trace a permanent mnemonic path are erased.

The successive removal of the wall layers – a method of uncovering the underlying surfaces – re-inscribe the space’s historical past since 1990, when the Ministry of Culture coordinated the efforts of a group of curators, historians, technicians and engineers. This triggered the countdown for the space’s revival and restoration as a museum.

Right above, a city made of densely stratified networks, technologies and strategies goes on building an incessantly escaping present.

[source- more info]

--end of part 1