The transfer of laboratory truth to the stage was the main concern of Christina Foitou in her live performance at Peri Arts Gallery. A conversation about body, movement, and performance as an autonomous art form.
When and how did you decide to get involved in performance?
I always felt a huge attraction to dance, dancers, and movement in all its forms. My involvement with performance began in the summer of 2011 for a group exhibition entitled "Pictures with gender".
The curator saw large drawings in my workshop created through unsuspecting interactions with dancer friends. He said: "How is it possible that you haven't thought about showing this to the world?" With his encouragement and the participation of contemporary dance teacher Natalia Partheniou, I built my first performance. The response was overwhelming, and we were asked to repeat it twice.
Going back to your first performance, what thoughts and hesitations come to mind?
Insecurity was great due to direct exposure to the public. What I did in my workshop was only a personal tool to create works; I never imagined it could stand as an autonomous work. Having attended Marina Abramović at the Venice Biennale, I knew the theory, but I lacked formal training and felt nervous about others calling it a 'performance'.
Yet, the moment the action started, everything felt completely natural. I felt united with my work and realized I had much to say through this medium.
"It looks like the body is taking the place of the brush and leaving its own fingerprints on the white surface."
Tell us about the passage from one art form to another and your expressive means...
In every performance, the core composition unites five elements: the white surface, charcoal, color, movement, and music. Previously, performance was a pre-planning tool — for example, my solo exhibition "Room 526" stemmed from a performance at Hotel Ariston during the Mediterranean Youth Festival.
In recent years, performance has become both the design tool and the final form. Holding charcoal and color with my whole body, I complete works by deconstructing them — an accidental writing guided by the body's pulse and the subconscious.
What keeps modern forms like performance away from traditional exhibition spaces?
Fear and caution. Often, a gallery represents a pristine, sterile environment where finished artworks are displayed and sold. A performance comes to comment, overturn, and even smear literally and figuratively. I feel fortunate that Olga Karteri left me completely free in her gallery. The public is mature and ready to embrace these expressions in unconventional places.
What is the role of live music during your performances?
Music is essential for the action to work harmoniously. Accompanied here by Thodoris Pistiolas on cello, live music ensures interaction with the moving body, generating tension and guiding the line. Painting is an incredibly lonely process, whereas performance allows for essential collaborations.
"Art, in all its forms, is balm, shelter, deep breaths, mental revival and fueling, rebirth."
Could you walk us through the narrative of "Break in..." (Violation)?
Title "Break in..." was my comment on the refugee tragedy and human pain. It unfolded in three distinct stages:
- Stage 1 (Inner Luggage): Kinetic interaction drawing the surrounding public and inviting them to deposit pieces of their inner lives — an intimate process of art therapy.
- Stage 2 (Violent Transition): Red color bled the surface, symbolizing how lives can be unexpectedly overturned. The public was invited to symbolically violate the work and life.
- Stage 3 (Epilogue & Rebuilding): Gathering the wreckage of all of us, hugging them, and attempting to reconcile to timidly rebuild a new life.
I continued timidly to survive in the hope of rebuilding a new life.
