A liaison to a life no longer ordered from above

(2021)

4k video / 28 min / sound

Cinematographer: Nuno Cassola

Sound: Kostadis Michail
Sound editing: Robert Kroos
Produced by: Yellow Brick, Athens

Performers: Aris Papadopoulos, Christina Karagianni, Stella Dimitrakopoulou, Aspasia Giannoulaki,

Markella Ksilogiannopoulou, Christos Fousekis

A liaison to a life no longer ordered from aboveis a work and a project by the artist Clara J:son Borg, which was co-created withthe artist and dancers Aris Papadopoulos, Christina Karagianni, Stella Dimitrakopoulou, Aspasia Giannoulaki, Markella Ksilogiannopoulou, and Christos Fousekis in Athens, June 2021. Over four weeks, the group explored ideas around urbanity and urban life through conversations, movement, and writing. The result of the research was reworked into a screenplay and filmed in the suburb ofNea Ionia in Athens.

In the film, Aris, Christina, Stella, Aspasia, Markella, and Christos share experiences of their urban life in Athens. They reveal their strategies for engaging with the city on a street level: how Aris goes for walks to make upnew stories about the city; how Aspasia’s fictive contemporary urban goddess persona empowers her to protect herself from male harassment; and how Christina, during her walks, acknowledges the city’s vertical hierarchicalstructures by listening to the languages spoken on different levels in buildings.

Their conversations also include their recent experience of being in a long, controlled lockdown during the COVID-19 pandemic. Stella talks about how moving through the city became a way to be invisible and bypass the police, and how the common sense around how to be in the urban environment needed to be renegotiated. The group discusses ideas about public and private spaces within the city and how itsinfrastructure allows them to build and sustain friendships.

Made possible by the generous support of Stichting Droom een Draad and the Mondriaan Fond.