January 2016

Purifications, folds

Performed in the 2nd exhibition dedicated to Thanos Murray-Velloudios at Beton7 on January 2016.

Read more on the exhibition.


August 2015 | Tinos Festival 2015

Empedocles: The four elements

DSCN5169

At Tinos Festival 2015 that took place this summer, Demosthenes Agrafiotis has presented four performances titled “Empedocles: The four elements”

Tinos Festival 2015 program: pdf

Visual poetry on Empedocles (pdf)

Empedocles: The four elements

Empedocles (Akragantas 484 (;) – 429 (;) BC) claimed that the world is made of four elements: earth, air, water and fire, and that it is governed by two opposing forces: filotita –love and hatred. Friedrich Hölderlin considered the work of Empedocles as a poetic milestone for European culture. According to the history and legend,  Empedocles was a poet, philosopher, social activist (for agricultural production issues, public health problems), political protagonist in democratic battles-causes of his fellow citizens. Finally, falling into the active volcano of Mount Etna and leaving his golden sandals on the walls of caldera as a signature, he allows us to consider him as the first performer or as the founder of the performance art. My four performances (in correspondence with the above four elements) aspire to give an homage to this important personality of Magna Grecia.

Demosthenes Agrafiotis.

Photos


Videos of the performances


2013-2014

On Lyotard

Robert BRIATTE – Text on performance On Lyotard – (pdf)

Exhibition EIDOS @ ISBA, Besançon – 12 march – 04 april 2014

Photos:


Permormative installations @ Beton7, Grèce – mai 2013

Photos:


Videos:


15-17 April 2014 | Besançon, FR

Excentricités 2014 | The in-Tension #2

Affiche-Excentricités-5.3.4      The_in_Tension_Poster_ENGLISH_

Exhibition .”The in-Tensions’ #2 , “Performance as Photography”

Curators : Demosthene Agrafiotis – Andreas Pashias.
Production : Epitelesis – Performance Art Foundation
Where : Studio 24, ISBA
When : 15-17 avril 2014
Opening: 15/04/2014 19h-21h

More info at ISBA blog (french).
Learn more about the programme of “Excentricité” at dagrafiotis.com (french)


21-22 March 2014 | Paris, France

Calligrammes

Pages-de-2014_03_21_22_Printemps_Poetes_Carton_1   Pages-de-2014_03_21_22_Printemps_Poetes_Carton-2

Les enfants de Guillaume Apollinaire et de la Méditerranée

Exhibition “Caligrammes, & après?”
Printemps des Poètes
21 & 22 March 2014

Program in french (pdf)
Une vision des enfants d’Apollinaire et de la Méditerranée – Nadine Agostini (pdf)

Demosthenes Agrafiotis participated with:

  • 4 calligrammes (photos)
  • 2 calligraphies (indian ink)
  • 3 Calli(pro)grammes (collages – mixt media)
  • Poetry and visual poetry book display
  • Video projection: ENTOPIES
  • PerformanceCRISE.IDENTITES FLUIDES (CRISIS. FLUID IDENTITIES)



2009-2013

On performance


performance | επιτέλεση

The action or the result of επιτελώ: to perform. Derivatives: επιτελώ/-ούμαι: to execute, to realize; επιτελεστικός, -ή, -ό: used as a translation of the term performative. In the Greek literature, the word επιτέλεση has been used as a translation of the english term performance, mainly in the field of Social Anthropology. Some departments of Greek universities offer a course on the “Anthropology of Performance”, while the performance studies have in some cases been translated as the studies ofεπιτέλεση. In the field of Art History, the word has been sporadically used as a translation of the termsperformance art, or art-action, that are usually translated as (visual) action, or (artistic) “dromenon”. Recently, the word performance tends to be used untranslated. According to Demosthenes Agraphiotis, the morpheme τελ of the word επιτέλεση “is related to the fulfillment of a thought, a wish, or a prophecy.” “In Homeric epic poems, the traveller επιτελεί, completes his route approaching the νόστος, the return to the motherland”. The meaning of the ancient Greek verb τελάω,-ώ was the realization of a journey, and its infinitive (τελείν) was demonstrating an action “in absolute agreement with plan, a command, a prayer, a promise or a prophecy.” This relationship is eloquent to other words with the morpheme τελ, such as τελετή (ritual/ceremony), τέλειο (perfect), τελεία (full stop), εκτέλεση(execution), ατελές (imperfect), συντελεστής (factor), τελεστής (operator), εκτελεστής(executioner),τελεσφορία (efficiency), τελειώνω (to finish).

Author and translator: Marios Hatziprokopiou
www.psimanifestolexicon.org



November 2013

The in_Tension @ APhF:13 – Beton7

Photography as Performance

“The in-Tension” at Beton7, Center for the Arts
Curated by Demosthenes Agrafiotis & Andreas Pashias
Presented by epitelesis – Performance Art Foundation

Press release (pdf)

As a part of Athens Photo Festival 2013, “The in-Tension” (Performance as Photography) is an
exhibition curated by visual and performance artists Demosthenes Agrafiotis and Andreas Pashias.
By examining the fusion of artistic practices experienced in the contemporary cultural scene, this
exhibition brings forward the work of prominent international artists as a crucial effort to re-
evaluate the relationship of performance art and photography. In performance art, the duration
required to execute an artwork is ‘equal’ to the actual artwork. Photography is introduced in this
process, as an attempt to capture the artist’s corporeal existence or
its trace in action. The
‘tension’ between
these two artistic practices is brought forward
through the contrast of a
performance’s duration unfolding over a specific period of time and the photographic instance
capturing only one frame/moment of action. Therefore, the ephemeral dimension of performance
art is quoted by the resulting photograph, into a document of permanence. As a pictorial essay,
this exhibition proposes the detached photograph as autonomous artwork and presents it alongside
similarly treated artistic output.

The differences between the art of performance and the art of photography come in diverse
formats, so that the performance artist and the photographer can choose the elements on which
they can build convergences and divergences. These formats of ‘intention’ can be realized through
a photograph taken
during a live performance, a still image captured
from a video performance,
an image of the artist
taken in collaboration with a photographer or even a self-photographed
image of the artist. The relationship between the performer and the photographer is formulated
according to the structural elements of these ‘in-tensions’. As a result, this exhibition is based upon
the formats of producing artwork by a ‘hybrid creator’, that rises through the merging of an artist’s
body and a photographer’s camera lens.

Performance artists: Abel Azcona · Alastair MacLennan · Alexandros Plomaritis · Amalia
Charikiopoulou · Andreas Pashias · Bartolomé Ferrando · BBB Johannes Deimling · Boris Nieslony ·
Carlos Martiel · Dagmar I. Glausnitzer-Smith · Demosthenes Agrafiotis · GRAAM · Grigoris
Semitecolo · Joseph Ravens · Julien Blaine · Katharina Kastl · Kurt Johannessen · Lala Nomada ·
Michel Collet · Monika Günther & Ruedi Schill · Pekka Kainulainen · Seiji Shimoda · Valentine
Verhaeghe

Photographers: Anne Lise Dehee · Daniel Häller · Dimitris Priftis · Fabrizio Garghetti · Jean Marc
de Samie · Jesse Clockwork · Jessica Smith · Jouko Vatanen · Juan Pablo Hoyos Ramírez · Kenny
Lemes · Manuel Vason · Mathias Pick · Miklos Legrady · Mishka Henner · Monika Sobczak · Rita
Rodrigues

Architectural Design: Melina Philippou

Opening: November 5th 2013, 20.00
Operating hours: Monday to Friday, 14.00-20.30 | Saturday, 14.00-18.00 | Closed on Sundays
Duration: November 5th –23rd 2013
Beton7, Center for the Arts | 7, Pydnas St. (Metro station “Kerameikos”| Votanikos)
Τel. : 210-7512625

The announcement at Beton7



8 May - 27 July 2013

The lying on the floor

DA’s NY performance presented at the exhibition

The lying on the floor, abandoned to lie

An exhibition about material in Performance Art
formed by E.P.I. Zentrum Cologne and Sibylle Ettengruber MAERZ-Gallery Linz and more than 80 artists around the world.
venue: Künstlervereinigung MAERZ,
place: Eisenbahngasse 20, Austria – 4020 Linz
date: 8. May till 27. July 2013 / Tu. – Fr. 3:00 – 6:00 pm / Sa. 1:00 – 4:00 pm

Three different currents are to unify in this presentation.
The first one is the infinite multiplicity of what material is and can be, and the second one shows up in the
question of what and how material appears and the third stream forms itself in the multiplicity of the
applicable regulations.
Which structure of order is the most sensible production of meaning and how the existing material enters
into a transfer and combination will be seen.
The structural limitation is the body of people acting and in this case especially the visible part.
Mental – and physical – and energetic views are kept back for further presentations and outsourced here.
The diagrammatic exhibition brings together about 80 artists from around the world. These have sent
documentary material from their own works and their practice of performance and life art. Photos, texts
and relics form the body of the exhibition.
Contrapuntal these materials will be grouped into ethnographic and anthropological photographical views
of human action.
Reasonable is an incompleteness , which is also due to the vitality of the human body, and the vitality and
momentum of the material.
During the display a blog is installed – http://thelyingonthefloorabandonedtolie.blogspot.co.at/
Have also a view on the webpage of the E.P.I. Archive: http://www.asa.de/asa_broschure.pdf
Info: www.asa.de / www.maerz.at

Exhibition’s concept: pdf

DA’s photo documentation