Constantine Gras
  • Gras Art
  • Film
  • Exhibitions
  • Blog
  • About/Contact

The North East Aegean Echoes To The Cries Of refugees

17/3/2018

4 Comments

 
Picture
Flag flutters for freedom over the Greek island of Oinousses.
Picture
Candles flame still for the Chios massacre and diaspora. 
Picture
No chime at church but the goats assemble with their brassy bells.
Picture
Mythological calm beyond the horizon. 
Picture
Kalos calamari!  
Picture
My cousin guards dinner plates teeming with tens of thousands of bass and bream.
Picture
End of shift. Shift. Play. 
Picture
I travel with Homer and Ms. Simpson to the castle at Mytilene.
Picture
Down at the taverna, news spills out about the landing of 17 Turkish asylum seekers.
Picture
Swimming against the tide that just won't turn.
Picture
Solitude on a beach with grains of sand that you can count in one palm. 
Picture
Final visit to the stone house that my grandfather built as a refugee from Asia Minor. 
Picture
The boat departs from Oinousses with a memory that can never return.
Picture
Greek War of Independence, 1821-1829
Greek nation state established after 400 years of Ottoman empire rule. 

Greco-Turkish War, 1919-1922
Greek invasion of Northwestern part of Anatolia is defeated with establishment of modern Turkish state. 

Treaty signed in 1923 to effect a population exchange of 1.5 million Greeks and Turks. 

UNESCO have just listed Rebeitko on its Cultural Heritage List. This is the music and dance that my grandparent's generation brought over to Greece in the 1920s after they were displaced from the crumbling Ottoman empire. The happenings at late night cafes and clubs articulated the feelings of refugees. They grappled with poverty and despair while searching for earthy love and spiritual consolation.

Oinousses is 1 mile from Chios and 5 miles west of Turkey. Its waters, airspace and land are contested. 

At its peak in 2015, more than one million migrants crossed the Mediterranean Sea. The islands of Lesbos, Chios and Oinousses, given their close proximity to the Turkish mainland, are one of easiest zones of approach into Europe for asylum seekers and economic migrants coming from Western Asia, South Asia and Africa. 
​

​I’m going to climb up to the highest mountain and sing.
When I cry and am in pain, the mountain will sigh. 
4 Comments
Jackie
21/3/2018 11:36:20

Dear Constantine,
Thank you so much for this, you master of meaning in pictures.
I have no words for how much you have moved me.
Love,
Jackie
xxxxxxx

Reply
Constantine Gras link
21/3/2018 18:51:55

Dear Jackie,
Thank you for your kind words. It's easier for me to post this creative document of my mother land and relate the family (and by extension, my) experience of diaspora to the contemporary world. One day, I will attempt to navigate the Polish journey of my family. At the moment, that is beyond me in words and images.
Constantine. x

Reply
Jacob Barua link
23/3/2018 14:33:13

Dear Constantine,

I was deeply moved by your mother singing and crying and singing. I can only guess how many layers of nostalgia and pain, interlaced with the lingering shards of long gone joys, are contained in her paean to a past that she reaches out towards with every single struggling note. Clawing back gently whatever can still be saved. Had she, perhaps, in a different time-space, posed for Eugene Delacroix's 'Greece on the Ruins of Missolonghi'? With palms wide open, like your mother, she poses a question that gets stuck in the throat...

All the best
Jacob Barua

Reply
Constantine Gras link
24/3/2018 08:41:22

Dear Jacob,
Thank you for those tender and perceptive comments. That audio recording is an extract. The full recording has my mum improvising on this rembetika song and breaking down as she recalls Kalamari (the strip of land where she was born on the island) and memories of her mother and father. The other painting that springs to mind is Delacroix's The Massacre at Chios.
Cheers Constantine.

Reply



Leave a Reply.

    HOME
    ​FILM
    EXHIBITIONS
    BLOG
    ABOUT/CONTACT

    Categories

    All
    Ar
    Architecture
    Art
    Belfast
    Books
    Built Environment
    Ceramic Art
    Chaplin
    Community
    Coronet Theatre
    Dance
    Derek Latham
    Design
    Drawing
    Edinburgh
    Environment
    Europe
    Exhibition
    Films
    Flood Light
    Gate Cinema
    Glasgow
    Grand Union Canal
    Greece
    Grenfell
    Henry James
    History
    Home
    Horror
    Irish
    Jacob Barua
    Kensal Green
    Lancaster West Estate
    Latymer Mapping Project
    Leo The Last
    Melodrama
    Melodramatic Elephant
    Migrant Crisis
    More West
    Music
    Nathaniel Westlake
    Nicholas Ray
    North Kensington
    Notting Hill
    Painting
    Photo Book
    Photography
    Pittsburgh
    Poland
    Portobello Film Festival
    Portrait Of A Lady
    Regeneration
    Sculpture
    Silchester Estate
    Siobhan Davies Dance
    Social Housing
    Soundtrack
    Stain Glass
    St Helen's Festival
    Still Moving
    Theatre
    Therapy
    This That
    This-That
    University Of Warwick
    V&A Museum
    Westway
    W. Eugene Smith

    Archives

    September 2021
    November 2019
    October 2019
    September 2019
    July 2019
    May 2019
    April 2019
    March 2019
    February 2019
    January 2019
    December 2018
    November 2018
    October 2018
    September 2018
    August 2018
    June 2018
    May 2018
    April 2018
    March 2018
    February 2018
    January 2018
    December 2017
    November 2017
    July 2017
    May 2017
    April 2017
    March 2017
    November 2016
    September 2016
    August 2016
    July 2016
    June 2016
    May 2016
    April 2016
    March 2016
    February 2016
    January 2016
    December 2015
    November 2015
    October 2015
    September 2015
    August 2015
    July 2015
    June 2015
    May 2015
    April 2015
    March 2015
    January 2015
    December 2014
    November 2014
    October 2014
    September 2014
    August 2014
    July 2014
    May 2014
    April 2014
    March 2014
    February 2014
    January 2014
    July 2013
    May 2013
    January 2013
    September 2012
    June 2012
    May 2012
    April 2012

    RSS Feed

Powered by Create your own unique website with customizable templates.
  • Gras Art
  • Film
  • Exhibitions
  • Blog
  • About/Contact