information
A study on the nature of photography and visual signification in collaboration with East End festival. Through a large photo-archive that has been built gradually from private collections, we explore past views of the island of Samos and its people in their everyday gestures and expressions.
In photography, as in any attempt of expression, coded meanings emerge through selective procedures that emphasise features while they exclude others. However, there always are elements that elude the intentions, little pockets of randomness that escape the “plan”.
Throughout the 19th and 20th century, for purposes of “hygiene” and “safety”, societies demanded the exclusion of “lepers” in confined spaces outside the city. We chose this kind of space, the old leper house of Κarlovasi, to locate our video installation. We can still see the traces of blue paint on its walls, a practice that was supposed to keep patients “calm”. Taking this “blue-ness” as a starting point we chose to move away from the confinement of meaning , to a wide open space of ambiguity and flux, the space of memories and dreams, of hopes and unknown emotions, vast as the sea nearby.
biography
Katerina Messini Short Bio Born in Athens, Greece, 1987. Received Master's Degree on Architecture Engineering at National Technical University of Athens , N.T.U.A in 2015 and is active since as an architect and 3d visualiser. Currently in the process of graduation from Athens School of Fine Arts. Interested in the blurred and subtle intersections of Science, the Arts and Humanistic Studies. Especially focused on the emergence of so called Modern Reason in the West from a broader perspective, that renders its vast intertwinements with economy, politics, philosophy and popular culture as well . A constant parallel thematic is the human body, and especially the female body as a physical entity but also as a “vessel” of concepts and significations that are culturally constructed. Artistically seeking ways of expression that that combine diverse modalities and traditions, primarily making use of a great variety of available digital media. Collaborative Exhibitions 2013 Athens Bienalle 2013 Agora, open call-online exhibition 2018 The H’ Workshop at Synoikismos, by Eleusis 2021 Capital of Culture 2019 A Fork In The Road, Foto Wien festival 2019 The Collection as an Automaton, ACG Art Gallery 2020 Green iDeal - Biennale della tecnologia, Paratissimaart station 2020 copyplanet.xyz, ongoing virtual art project