Vera Chotzoglou (1992, Athens) lives and works between Athens and Berlin. Chotzoglou’s objective is to record moments and events using documentary and narrative films, as well as sound, photographic, and video installations. Chotzoglou was a Stavros Niarchos Foundation Fellow (2019) and film award winner at both the 22nd Thessaloniki International GLAD Film Festival (2021) and the 2nd Piraeus Film Festival in Athens (2018).
UNDER THE SAND, THE WAVES
Video, 2020–2022
The artist spent her time during COVID lockdowns recording the sound of the city from a balcony and from a specific spot by the sea. Chotzoglou composed a living soundscape through 120 hours of physical recordings, along with covert filming in the outdoors. She is interested in the Greek (and other) government's instrumentalization of quarantine, which forced citizens to be a maximum distance of up to a kilometer away from their homes. When groups of teenagers visited the abandoned beach volleyball court of the 2004 Athens Olympic Games, they became characters in a film without narration. In an almost choreographic and anthropological documentary, in a condition of waiting and simultaneous resistance, efforts towards the recovery and reclaiming of public space, as well as of the bodies within it, emerged.
From the socio-political condition that followed the pandemic, emerged a different management of resistance and revolution, than the one we knew thus far. Through a generation that, although accused of numbness and apathy, is “tired of waiting” and is reclaiming its role, its place, and its voice in the storm of historical developments.
Filmed exclusively at sunset, the film marks the echo of one day and the metaphorical dawn of another. It is defined by the necessary “defeat” of all human endeavors, with failure as an essential stage in the individual's path of self-fulfillment and effort toward change.
Eighteen years and two lockdowns later, the stadium was permanently closed to the public after “complaints” of vandalism. It will be guarded by a private security company 24/7, until the redevelopment of the area is finished.