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 THE
NEW - GREEK KARAGIOZIS
Marina
Petri outlines the personality of the contemporary
Greek with humor but also with a critical glance
through the familiar to all of us figure of Karaghiozis.
The cunning and crafty protagonist of the theater
of shadows. She transforms herself into a busy puppeteer
and moves the threads of the artistic game. She
creates images, often through the assemblage of
different materials, and narrates everyday stories.
She enriches the traditional thematic scheme of
Karaghiozis with new actions and modernizes her
sly hero.
Gone are the days of slavery, poverty and misery!
Karaghiozis, in the role of the contemporary Greek,
is a free and satisfied man. A member of the European
Community, an official citizen of the Continent.
Educated, he knows everything just like his co-actor
Morfonios from whom he steals in Petri's work some
additional characteristics. For example, he displays
the arrogance of the intellectual, he dresses elegantly,
he likes to show off and he is just too fond of
himself.
Karaghiozis the contemporary Greek, an admirer and
victim of fashion, acquires one more European trait,
that of the passionate art-lover, an art-collector
to be. A regular visitor of the past, he travels
with a time machine to the realm of yesterday in
order to speak privately -like a successful yuppie-
with his favorite artists: the marginal Caravaggio,
the lustful Balthus, the exotic Gauguin, the Mediterranean
Picasso -a pioneer of cubism along with Braque-
the explosive Pollock, to name but a few..
A fanatic patriot, he is particularly proud of antiquity
and the Byzantium. He admires the linearity of the
ancient vases, the clear contours that form the
shapes and remind him of his morphology...
As a true Greek, Karaghiozis feels he is first!
A worthy successor of Herodotus, Thales, Pythagoras,
Socrates, Heraclitus and so many others. The latter's
philosophy has greatly influenced him, that is why
he perpetually changes while combining in his temperament
the extreme opposites: the traits of the comic and
the tragic hero. Funny, but at the same time a smart
aleck and a know-all, he repeatedly overcomes the
limits and becomes ridiculous, a pitiable vagabond,
wandering around aimlessly, shifting opportunistically
according to the wind...
However, Petri escapes from the various ideologies
concerning what is named "Greekness"...
Bia Papadopoulou
Art Historian
Writen
by BIA PAPADOPOYLOY and MARINA PETRI
Illystrated dy MARINA PETRI
pag
page.48 .
PRICE . 20 euro
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