The final exhibition of the HOME project took place during Photometria International Photography Festival in Ioannina during 2-30 June 2016 at the Municipal Gallery of Ioannina

The exhibition opening was great! We have been mounting the exhibition till the last minute. There were many people that stayed for hours showing their interest in all the works of the exhibition.

Here are some details of the works:

The concept of home is open to all interpretations for greek and Turkish arists of the exhibition of the project ‘HOME’ that inaugurates on Thrusday 2nd of June 2016 and will remain open to the public till the 30th of June in the Municipal gallery of Ioannina. Home as memory, as feeling,as culture, common tradition, gesture, language or mentality. The photographers Eva Voutsaki, Selen Tuğrul, Korhan Karaoysal, Lila Zotou, Neslihan Koyuncu, Dimitris Rapakousis and Photini Papahatzi explore the concept of HOME through artistic expression, photographic installations, archives and oral stories.

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In the installation ‘Sirens’ of Eva Voutsaki, the family album transforms into isolated figures that represent shadows of their previous selves. The work underlines the degradation of the normality of being that is brought with political events that people have no control over.

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Selen Tuğrul in ‘Patina’ searches for the traces on the surfaces that remind the migrations that happened in Karaburun, the peninsula of Erithrea. This is an artistic research, find, treatment and collection memories from geography, in order to discover the story behind the lack of connections to family roots and the reconstitution of her own lost memory.

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Dimitris Rapakousis in ‘Uterus’ returns to the intimacy of childhood and the city he was born and raised. In this memory and observation he reconstitutes in himself and in his familiar surroundings.

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Neslihan Koyuncu with ‘-akis’ (in Turkish means reflection, echo, while in Greek is a common suffix of surnames of Greek descent from Crete) follows its origins, genetic heritage and the lost memories of grand-grandparents from Crete. She researches for similar stories from other families with a history of migration, looking for reciprocity on emotions, nostalgia and sense of belonging among different generations.

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Lila Zotou residing abroad learned to live with a complex of nostalgia, memories and expectations. She photographes sites, which at that time do not carry specific personal history and memory. Then reconstructs the images of an environment where memory and personal history meet and formed again from scratch.

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Korhan Karaoysal photographs empty cages in zoos and artificial homes for animals. They are framed with the portrait of Ota Benga (a Congolese pygmy, presented as an anthropological exhibit at a trade show in St Louis, Missouri in 1904, and at the Bronx Zoo in 1906). His work refers to different interpretations and uses of ‘home’, the ‘domesticated’ and ‘culture’, concepts that he refers to by using their dictionary meaning in the text accompanying the installation.

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The ‘Home’ of Photini Papahatzi has a personal starting point which is the actual and symbolic quest of her ancestor’s house in Burdur, Turkey (formerly Polydorion). It traces in a road trip the route of her forced migration that she took in 1922 from Burdur to Izmir. It is a self-reflective project, like a visual diary, including photographs, video footage, interviews, archival research, personal and found objects from the areas where the enforced immigration has happened.

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The exhibition is the output of the project ‘HOME’ that is implemented in the framework of TANDEM Cultural Managers exchange – Turkey 2015-6 by the cultural managers Nazlı Deniz Oğuz from Ka Fotoğraf Geliştirme Atölyesi based in Ankara, Turkey and Photini Papahatzi from Entefxis - Photometria Festival based in Ioannina, Greece.

We are thankful to Stavros Niarchos Foundation who granted their support in producing the exhibition in Ioannina, Greece during the  Photometria Festival 2016 and their support for the production of the book.

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