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Region: Central Greece

The cities of Leo Rapitis

The fascinating life of the Greek composer of three continents and five seas unfolds through music and visual fragments, reflecting the essence of the era that shaped him. For composer Leo Rapitis, a child of a strange and liberated time—before the Nazi shadow covered Europe—found himself in the England of sensitive troubadours, Noël Coward, Ivor Novello, and musicals. He brought back to Greece (perhaps the first and only one to do so) something of the charm of interwar Britain.

An enigmatic figure of the Greek music scene during both the pre-war and post-war periods, Leo Rapitis wrote songs performed by Sofia Vembo, the Kalouta sisters, Nikos Gounaris, and Panos Visvardis. His music continues to boldly resonate today, with echoes of a hidden past. Did his audience at the time recognize their own passions behind his notes? His melodies, intertwined with historical moments and the emotional sensitivity of an entire era, remain alive—reinterpreted by contemporary artists and infused with new meaning in today’s musical landscape. Rapitis’s work proves that music, when in dialogue with history, becomes timeless.

Michalis Papapetrou—conductor, pianist, and director of the ERT Choir—undertakes to reintroduce the music of Leo Rapitis, shedding light on the composer’s personal journey through his songs: from Athens to Manchester, Palestine, New York, and finally to the Belgian Congo, where he ended his life under the mistaken belief that he had killed his lover.

The orchestration draws on the familiar timbres of the era, while adding a polyphonic ensemble that brings out the jazz elements of his music. Leo Rapitis’s story is deeply moving: a man initially forced by his family to follow a path that wasn’t his, but ultimately won over by music. The “Deconstructed Loom” becomes a symbol of this journey. This traditional weaving tool transforms into a space of liberation—the fabric unravels, the strings are revealed, and music finds its way again.

Aeschylus’ Persians – The Happy Days

Following a dream that foreshadows disasters for her son, Queen Atossa of Persia is informed that the Persian army has been destroyed. Emerging from the underworld, her dead husband, Darius, explains the reasons that led to the defeat and urges them to stop the attacks against the Greeks.

In this new production, Aeschylus’ ancient drama converses with Samuel Beckett’s play, Happy Days. The performance draws upon Beckett’s masterful conception, creating a striking spectacle that employs Aeschylus’ poetry intact. The Queen of Persia, immobilized by the weight of her memories, gradually immerses herself in the burden of tragic past events. Sitting next to her, her deceased companion reads the devastating news in the newspaper.

This new piece reminds us that our past cannot be cut off from our future; they both co-exist intact within our present.

Model Collapse: Love you, bye  

In the exhibition Model Collapse: Love you, bye, Maria Mavropoulou explores parallels between the human brain and artificial intelligence in terms of their decay process. The gradual loss of memories, as it manifests in cases of dementia or Alzheimer’s, is compared to the phenomenon of model collapse in artificial intelligence, where models are fed back with the data they’ve produced, leading to errors.

Following research on patients in the early stages of dementia, the artist documents personal stories and objects associated with their memories while conversing with artificial intelligence applications to comment on the distance between an individual’s contradictory subjectivity and the supposed objectivity of AI models’ data.

The exhibition is enriched by the dialectical relationship between the works and the archaeological findings showcased at the Archaeological Museum of Eretria, a par excellence repository of collective memory.

The work invites audiences to reflect on the significance of human memory and the role of technology in shaping our collective and individual identities.

Hounds of Madness

The performance Hounds of Madness draws from Euripides’ The Bacchae, exploring notions of collectivity, ritual, and ecstasy. Through a dynamic blend of movement, voice, and music, the choreographic work brings forth the Chorus’s autonomous artistic status, reimagined as a collective of women who are bound by both tender support and sharp resilience.

Hounds of Madness is an invitation to engage in a transformative game that directly confronts the deep-seated fears within us. It asks urgent questions relevant to our increasingly fear-driven world: What truly unites us? What fuels our motivation? And what ultimately sets us free?

This production delves into one of history’s earliest fictional accounts of female bodily autonomy. Hounds of Madness brings together a diverse group of women with and without sensory and motor disabilities, a group that in Modern Greece struggles to find their place both within society and on the stage. Their presence mirrors the women of Thebes in Euripides’ play, who defiantly fled to Mount Kithairon to escape patriarchal control, emphasizing a shared spirit of defiance and liberation.

Α choreographic work that bridges the historical trace with contemporary readings on the role of women as subjects of resistance and emancipation of their bodies. A transcendent dance composed in a post-Bacchae universe.

 

*Many thanks to Katia Savrami, Christos Papamichael

* The performance will be accessible to individuals with visual and mobility disabilities. There will be a tactile guided tour before the start of the performance for blind and visually impaired people.

Father & Son A Dialogue Through Jazz – The Weight of Legacy

In the musical performance titled Father & Son: A Dialogue Through Jazz – The Weight of Legacy, internationally acclaimed saxophonist and composer Dimitris Vassilakis, along with Nestor Vassilakis, a representative of the new generation of musicians, converse through music, exploring the relationship between tradition and innovation. The concert programme features a selection of jazz standards and original compositions from both father and son, engaging in a constant poetic dialogue that also allows for the use of artificial intelligence as a real-time oracle to bridge the generations.

Τselementés

“Tselementés,” the Greek synonym for cookbook, grandma’s old and cherished item, represents an heirloom of significant sentimental value. Browsing through it, we begin to feel a sense of nostalgia. However, as we delve deeper into its pages, what starts to emerge before us is the repression of a perhaps not-so-distant time.

The performance, inspired by the introductory texts of Nikolaos Tselementés’ Cookbook, the most iconic manual of Greek cuisine, serves as an invitation to reflect on gender roles and societal expectations.

Four performers, “good housewives,” use the Tselementés as a storytelling tool, taking turns in the roles of narrator, commentator, and acting subject while calling upon us to engage with the past and contemplate women’s position across time. Through flavours, smells, humour, and satire, we follow the story of an entire generation, along with the thread that connects it to our own.

*The performance is accompanied by Sandra Domvrou’s visual exhibition titled “Good Housewife.”

Konstantinos Vita: Space and Memory

PCAI presents its new exhibition by acclaimed artist, musician and composer Konstantinos Vita titled Space and Memory, curated by Kika Kyriakakou, PCAI artistic director. The exhibition and accompanying live performance respond to the central thematic axis of the Ministry of Culture 2025 programmeAll of Greece, One Culture: The Reception of the Past – Today Viewed as Tomorrow and Yesterday (Andreas Empirikos).

This original programme aims to occupy musically and visually the historic Pikionis Pavilion—now known as “pi”—and to engage with the important architectural heritage of the monument, the historical weight of the Delphi region, and the surrounding natural and energetic landscape.

The title of the project is inspired by the first poetry anthology of major post-war poet Nikos-Alexis Aslanoglou (Difficult Death, 1954). Vita’s prolific work over the years spans musical composition, lyric writing, poetry, drawing, and painting. This exhibition of Vita and PCAI is triggered by Empiriko’s quote and enters into dialogue with Aslanoglou’s poetry, exploring artistic connections to the past, memory and the present. In this context Konstantinos creates a series of new paintings (oil, pencil and acrylic) accompanied by a live music performance. These works are in tune with the unique natural and energetic landscape of Delphi and the architectural character of the Pavilion, inviting visitors to experience and interpret them during the event.

Konstantinos Vita states: “Memory in the poetry of Nikos-Alexis Aslanoglou is not only individual, it is collective, historical and deeply Greek. Through his writing and personal experiences, the wounds and transformations of postwar Greece emerge. Aslanoglou’s Greece is a country of memory—marked by existential anguish and reflection. While reading his poems, I felt the need to create certain images. His poetic voice becomes a space of nostalgia, loss, and awareness, reflecting the soul of contemporary Greece”.

Kika Kyriakakou, artistic director of PCAI notes that: “The visual language of Konstantinos Vita is a marvelous expression of his multi-dimensional talent. As part of the exhibition and the music that accompanies it, his work harmoniously converses with Aslanoglou’s poetry and the Delphic landscape, offering us a return to the poetic self”.

Athanasios Polychronopoulos, Polygreen CEO and PCAI Founder, states: “It is a great pleasure to collaborate with the Ministry of Culture’s programme “All of Greece, One Culture” and with the prominent and highly respected artist and musician Konstantinos Vita”.

Playing in the Neighbourhoods of Asia Minor

An experiential event for children, with elements of dramatised documentary and narrative performance and with original music, revolving around the games in the neighbourhoods of Asia Minor, which “tell” in their own way the everyday life of the communities prior to the 1922 Catastrophe. Games that seem forgotten, played without ever being told, left to perish along with the hope for the return to the motherland.

The thread of collective memory unfolds through a story that travels in time, through playing with children games that were passed down by those who saw pain in refugee yards, along with the smile of a carefree childhood.

Stories of integration and rebirth in a new land as well as ways used to express resourcefulness, the grace and imagination of a people, will be presented with the help of contemporary audiovisual means and restored old toys.

From Asia Minor to Northern Evia

Seventeen refugee settlements were integrated into Northern Evia. Four out of these transformed into separate refugee villages that took their names from respective regions of Asia Minor: Neos Pirgos, Neo Mousarli, Nea Egin, Nea Sinasos.

Refugees from Prokopi of Cappadocia, Makri and Livisi, Marmara, the region of Smyrna, Ardassa in Pontus, Michaniona in the area of Kyzikos in Propontis, and Yosgati in the far reaches of Asia Minor, settled in Northern Evia, bringing along their traditions and know-how, and breathing new life into the place.

A performance combining the screening of stories of present-day descendants of refugees and archival photographs with the live presentation of original compositions based on the rhythms and melodies of Asia Minor, attempts to capture the contribution of refugees to the shaping of this place’s new identity, taking the audience on a journey across a past yet recent space-time continuum.

PARALLEL TEXTS or THE VISITORS

What a sweet summer evening… Everything you need for a soirée, a reception, a garden party at least. This is how paradise must be like, don’t you agree? A place of recreation perhaps. A heavenly city. And then nothing.

At the Eretria Museum refreshment room, four visitors drink soft drinks, eat chips, and through the museum’s audio tour of the Asia Minor Catastrophe, they become connected to history, memory, the meaning of the city, cosmopolitanism, extermination and destruction. As time goes by, the questions from the loudspeaker, the songs and the dances alternate with the historical information, the meaning of Hellenism, History, the mythical cities, the conditions that changed the world, the literary narratives and the image of Smyrna.

Finally, what should one remember from the world memory? And what should one erase?