The performance will take place on Sunday, October 5, 2025, at 19:00 at Gate E8, where the Art Explora Festival will be held from 3 to 12 October 2025.

The installation–performance "HEAVY ZEYBEK" investigates the possibilities of sonic diversion: how rhythm and sonic texture can be slowed down to stillness, altered, or deconstructed through frequencies, vibrations, temporal shifts, and sonic distortions.

The work is part of Panos Charalambous’s ongoing research into the expressions of popular culture in the Balkan and Mediterranean region — song, dance, festive practices — beyond conventional notions of "authentic revival". In Piraeus, a port of transformations and crossings, this exploration acquires particular resonance, linking the local context to a broader cultural landscape.

About the Art Explora Festival
In 2024, the Art Explora Foundation introduces its flagship project: a museum boat and a traveling festival that will explore the seas and oceans around the world, offering unique artistic and cultural experiences. This unprecedented adventure aligns with the foundation's ambition to reduce cultural barriers and promote a broader and more democratic engagement with the arts. From October 3rd to 12th, 2025, the Art Explora Festival will dock at Gate E8 in the Port of Piraeus. Admission to all events is free.

Co-organised by Art Explora Foundation & Athens Digital Arts Festival (ADAF)
Under the auspices of The Ministry of Culture & the Region of Attica

HEAVY ZEYBEK
Gate E8, Port of Piraeus
Sunday, 5 October 2025, 19:00

Panos Charalambous, HEAVY ZEYBEK

Curated by Dimitris Trikas, the exhibition takes place at the Athens Conservatory from October 2 to November 1, 2025.

From the utopias of antiquity and Plato’s Republic to the Cubo-Futurist manifestos, technological optimism, and the dystopias of our time, the history of humanity has been continually infused with the pursuit of a better world.

The visual art exhibition "Tatlin’s Dream. Utopias. The Eternal Return.", curated by Dimitris Trikas, explores these trajectories of imagination and political thought, shedding light on how utopia—sometimes as hope, others as threat—continues to inspire humankind to confront the present and envision the future.

Hosted at the Athens Conservatory, an emblematic modernist building–utopia designed by architect Ioannis Despotopoulos, the exhibition is accompanied by an extensive public programme including talks, performances, and artistic actions, in collaboration with universities and research laboratories.

Participating artists:
Dimitris Alithinos, Dimitris Ameladiotis, Philippos Vassiliou, Kostis Velonis, Babis Venetopoulos, Vasilis Vlastaras, Stratis Vogiatzis, Antonis Volanakis, Vasilis Gerodimos, Nikos Giavropoulos, Giannis Grigoriadis – Giannis Isidorou, Sofia Damouli, Anastasia Douka, Giorgos Drosos, Katerina Zafeiropoulou, Thodoros Zafeiropoulos, Pinelopi Thomaïdi, Nadia Kalara, Fotini Kalle, Babis Karalis, Anastasis Karras, Zissis Kotionis – Marianthi Efthymiou, Alex Louloudis, Architects of the Whale & Alexandra Bisa & The Pokari Project, Eirini Mantinou, Anastasis Meletis, Nikos Moschos, Eleni Mouzakiti, Mania Benissi, Katerina Botsari, Nourako, Maria Papanikolaou, Dana Papachristou, Pinelopi Petsini – Nikos Panagiotopoulos, Nikos Podias, Panos Prophetis, Dimitris Rentoumis, Kyrillos Sarris (1950–2024), Fani Sofologi, Marios Spiliopoulos, Athanasia Tsatsou, Giorgos Tserionis, Athanasia Tsopanargia, Maro Fasouli, Marios Fournaris, Youla Chatzigeorgiou, Marios Chatziprokopiou – Antonis Antoniou (video editing), ce_lab (Christos Charisis – Eleni Molyva), Kostas Christopoulos.

Tatlin’s Dream. Utopias. The Eternal Return.
Curator: Dimitris Trikas
Organized by: Rizes Politismou Non-Profit Cultural Organization
Duration: October 2 – November 1, 2025
Venue: Athens Conservatory, Rigillis & Vasil. Georgiou B 17–19, Athens
Opening: Thursday, October 2, 2025

Nikos Podias, Mind the Gap, 2025

Myrto Xanthopoulou is the recipient of the Art Athina Young Artist Award for emerging visual artists, presented for the fourth consecutive year as part of the fair’s initiative to support artistic creation.

The Young Artist Award is an initiative of the Hellenic Art Galleries Association. For the fourth time, Art Athina collaborates with MOMus – Alex Mylonas Museum, one of the five museums that form the Metropolitan Organisation of Museums of Visual Arts of Thessaloniki (MOMus). The award consists of a solo exhibition at the MOMus – Alex Mylonas Museum in 2026.

After reviewing fourteen submissions and following deliberation, the five-member jury unanimously decided to grant the award to Myrto Xanthopoulou. According to the committee’s statement, Xanthopoulou’s practice develops with consistency and coherence, characterized by the breadth and multiplicity of her artistic media — installations, constructions, drawings, videos, and performances. Her work shows a distinct interest in language as an expressive tool, while various disposable and everyday single-use materials constitute a central element of her artistic vocabulary.

With a reflective and simultaneously melancholic or playful approach, she creates environments out of small gestures, overturning and transforming the given conditions of reality. Her work captures the power of detail and the minimal, as well as her bodily engagement with materials. The notion of the archive, the multiplicity of meanings, and the coexistence of opposites also play a decisive role in her artistic proposals.

The 2025 award jury consisted of:
Polyna Kosmadaki – Art Historian and Curator of Modern and Contemporary Art, Benaki Museum
Christoforos Marinos – Art Historian and Curator
Thouli Misirloglou – Art Historian and Artistic Director, MOMus – Museum of Contemporary Art – Collections of the Macedonian Museum of Contemporary Art and the State Museum of Contemporary Art
Yannis Bolis – Art Historian and Head of the Department of Contemporary Sculpture, MOMus – Alex Mylonas Museum
Anna Mykoniati – Art Historian and Curator, National Museum of Contemporary Art (EMST)

Myrto Xanthopoulou, Art Athina 2025 © Giannis Boziaris

CITRONNE Gallery and the Hellenic American Union present "Matrix of Worlds", a photography exhibition by Muriel Pénicaud (September, 17 – October 8, 2025). The exhibition is part of the Applied Greek–French Dialogues initiative.

Muriel Pénicaud is a distinguished figure in French public life, former Minister of Labour and Ambassador of France to the OECD. Less known, however, is her identity as an accomplished photographer of international recognition and acclaim. The starting point of her photographic practice lies in her numerous professional and personal journeys, and the experiences that accompany them. The exhibition presents scenes, narratives, and snapshots from the fragile trajectory of our world.

"Matrix of Worlds" serves as a "registry" of humanity—not merely recording visible reality but seeking to reveal the hidden truth that lies beyond first impressions. Pénicaud draws inspiration from the great photographer Henri Cartier-Bresson and his belief that photography should "align the mind, the eye, and the heart". In this spirit, she avoids stylized or staged imagery, following instead her guiding desire that "each viewer becomes the storyteller of their own narrative".

The "Matrix" reflects a personal visual exploration. The wings of birds, human figures, familiar or unknown landscapes, deep-rooted trees, and the bearers of the future emerge through the interplay of light and shadow, transforming into vessels of meaning addressed to the viewer.

Her works have been exhibited in Paris, India, Senegal, Beijing, Tokyo, the United States, and Spain.

"Matrix of Worlds" marks Muriel Pénicaud’s first photographic exhibition in Greece. It is presented within the framework of the Applied Greek–French Dialogues and is curated by Dr Tatiana Spinari-Pollali, Art Historian and Director of CITRONNE Gallery.

Venue: Hadjikyriakos-Ghika Gallery, Hellenic American Union, 22 Massalias Street, Athens

Muriel Pénicaud, Reconciliation? Rio de Janeiro, Brazil, 2015