Metropolis, Centre, Epicentre, the Absolute Greek City, Greek Provinces and Athens. Violence in the centre, immigrants, abandonment, seizure, the battle for sovereignty in the neighbourhoods of the centre. Interventions in the historical urban fabric, the cultural infrastructure, the Metro. The linear Metro routes as paths of the new map of Athens, the neighbourhoods that do not connect. The micro-scale of life at the streets of Athens, the Unknown City and the unknown cities that comprise Athens. The end of a national highway route, the end of a railway line. The Attica prefecture, the abandonment of the centre by the Athenians. The almost exclusive cultural production for a whole country, the cultural nucleus, 50% of the Greek population. Immigration gateway, Piraeus, the Port. The universities, the Parks, the archaeological sites. New Squares at Exarchia, the bourgeoisie of Exarchia, the theatre productions, the anarchists of Exarchia, the cops, the infrastructure…

These are some of the Urban Fragments we hold about Athens, as visitors or as architects. From a distance; their synthesis can only materialise into a palimpsest juxtaposing the misery of Athens, vindicating the citizens that chose -by chance- to live in this city. We have a lot of stories to tell, this fragmented one is assembled in a short film constructing a new parallel alternative map of Athens.
 
 
 
 
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Urban Fragments – Athens from a distance was presented in Urban Transcripts 2010 “Athens: urban (r)evolution through individual spontaneity in the absence of planning”, in Athens, Greece, December 2010. CREDITS: archIV+ (Boumpari E., Dounas T., Iliadi N., Xanthopoulou, S.,) in collaboration with Mastorodimou, E. and Zacharakis, A.

archIV+ was a multidisciplinary architecture and design group with expertise in architecture, urbanism, fashion design, cultural anthropology and the digital realm. It operated from 2010 to 2012 with various participations in competitions, ad-hoc exhibitions and urban interventions. ArchIV+ consisted of Eleni Boumpari, Theodore Dounas, Natalia Iliadi and Sofia Xanthopoulou, The team’s main mission was the provision of services regarding research, design and construction as well as the production of high quality work in the fields of architecture and urbanism. The project “Athens from a distance” was accomplished in collaboration with Apostolos Zacharakis (Freelance Photographer) and Efi Mastorodimou (Social Anthropologist). It encapsulated the élan of the Athenian metropolis, the underground envy of the Greek periphery and the lost urban innocence and was crafted as a project for the first exhibition of Urban Transcripts.

Volume 1, no. 1 March 2017