Onassis STEGI invites you to explore the ‘after’ of a city striving to be reborn. Athens, forever lingering between a permanent crisis and a desire for stability, is looking for its next day. But what is that, when the now feels suspended in midair?
The Covid-19 pandemic revealed a series of problems and possibilities in the contemporary way of life and our societies. States seek to overcome the fragmented nature of globalisation and strengthen interstate collaboration. The crisis demonstrated the critical importance of public health systems and the necessity to put human life above economic indexes. Paradoxically, social distancing did not lead to social indifference. On the contrary, new forms of digital and physical solidarity practices and common goods were created in the Athenian neighbourhoods and ‘polykatoikies’, which produced a strong feeling of respect between the same and the ‘other’, the known and the unknown, the young and the elderly.
At the same moment, the generalised global slowdown offers some relief to all other inhabitants of this planet. Pollution levels are visibly down. The global buzz is being replaced by our common breath. Can the prolonged silence curfew teach us something about how to transform our cities into more sustainable human-nature ecosystems?
Artists, designers, developers, musicians, lawyers or anyone else interested is invited to apply for a four-week e-research programme (27 May - 24 June 2020) aiming at developing digital works addressing the question of ‘what comes after?’. Proposals may include fiction or non-fiction essays, games, photo-essays, 3D visualisations, video, net art, net installations, apps, and other experimental digital media.
Four proposals will be selected through the application process and each will receive a grant of 1500€. The creators will have four weeks to develop their works in collaboration with the curator, which will be presented to the public through the Onassis Foundation website and its social media platforms, and will be considered to be included in a collective publication about the outcomes of the programme.
