© Francesco Nazardo

Atopos BlahBlahBlah is a project curated by Vassilis Zidianakis and inspired by Atopos’ research for its new book titled UNLOCKED; a publication that attempts to “unlock” the depiction of the Naked Body in post-photographic, digital era.

As part of the Atopos BlahBlahBlah program Kostis Stafylakis presented a lecture followed by a discussion under the title Rethinking the critique of presence: body and gesture in the post-internet condition. In 1981, feminist artist Mary Kelly published a critical text that scrutinized the axioms of performance: performance art was a genre disposed to challenge the metaphysical standards of modernism – the hegemony of the white male self-expressed individual artist. Kelly claimed that performance’s recourse to the “bodily”, the “gestural”, the suffering and the self-wounding was the latest recuperation of modernist “metaphysics of presence” in a row of dubious attempts to overthrow it. Is this critique still relevant today? The UNLOCKED publication by ATOPOS cvc offers an opportunity to revisit the question and explore the role of presence in recent post-internet imagery. What does the return of bodily representation mean? What does it testify for? Which certainties does it bring along or challenge?

About the artist

Kostis Stafylakis is an art theorist and artist. He graduated from the Athens School of Fine Arts. He holds an MA in Modern Art and Theory (Uni. Essex) and an MA in Continental Philosophy (Uni. Essex). He received his doctorate from the Department of Political Science and History, Panteion University, Athens, focusing on the political discourse launched by 21st century global art shows and especially Documenta 11. Along with Yannis Stavrakakis, he edited the anthology The Political in Contemporary Art (Ekkremes 2008). He taught Research-based Art at the Unit of Innovation and Entrepreneurship at the Athens School of Fine Arts and he currently teaches Art and Visual communication at the University of Patras. He was co-curator of AGORA, the 4^th Athens biennial. Along with Vana Kostayola, he runs kavecS, an experiment with modes of overidentification.

Date and Hour //
Wednesday May 11th 2016 // 19:00 to 22:00

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