FYTA (

Greek Greek may refer to: Greece Anything of, from, or related to Greece, a country in Southern Europe: *Greeks, an ethnic group. *Greek language, a branch of the Indo-European language family. **Proto-Greek language, the assumed last common ancestor ...

: ΦΥΤΑ, meaning plants) are an Athens-based

conceptual art Conceptual art, also referred to as conceptualism, is art in which the concept(s) or idea(s) involved in the work take precedence over traditional aesthetic, technical, and material concerns. Some works of conceptual art, sometimes called insta ...

and

performance art Performance art is an artwork or art exhibition created through actions executed by the artist or other participants. It may be witnessed live or through documentation, spontaneously developed or written, and is traditionally presented to a pu ...

duo. Their work problematises Greek identity and nationalism. FYTA's work combines different media and disciplines mostly operating within the wider framework of overidentification,

queer ''Queer'' is an umbrella term for people who are not heterosexual or cisgender. Originally meaning or , ''queer'' came to be used pejoratively against those with same-sex desires or relationships in the late 19th century. Beginning in the lat ...

politics and anti-humanist art, while they aim at a performative destabilisation of concepts of truth and nature / the natural.

Background

"Fyta are far from a fringe group in the Greek art world" and curate regular shows working with the Athens queer community as well as producing artefacts of their own. In an article about Greek queer politics and aesthetics, the Journal of Greek Media and Culture described the work of FYTA as “highly iconoclastic” and “new directors who seem to follow their own path”. Dazed has named their curatorial work as “avant-garde”, while they are also seen as having “an important characteristic often missing by many fine artists: irony and a sense of humour”.

Work

Their artistic work has been shown at The Scala London, NGBK Berlin, Berlin Porn Film Festival, Cuntemporary London, Bâtiment d'art contemporain, Gdańska Galeria Miejska, the Onassis Cultural Centre, and the Zoumboulakis Gallery. In 2013, they participated at the 4th

Athens Biennale The Athens Biennale (abbr. AB) is an international cultural event held every two years at various locations in Athens, consisting of a large-scale exhibition and a diverse programme of side events, such as performances, workshops, lectures etc. It ...

, AGORA.

Publications

The Black Book of FYTA (2017) contains descriptions and photos of FYTA’s work with analyses on arts and politics by academics. It received a distinction at the "Artist Catalogue design" category at the EBGE_Greek Design and illustration awards 2018. In 2021, they published an article in Studies in Theatre and Performance on their curation of The Garden of Dystopian Pleasures reflecting on the role of critical artistic practice in responding to contemporary right-wing radicalisation.

Academic presentations

They have given academic presentations at the

London College of Communication The London College of Communication is a constituent college of the University of the Arts London. It specialises in media-related subjects including advertising, animation, film, graphic design, photography and sound arts. It has approximately ...

Royal Holloway University Royal Holloway, University of London (RHUL), formally incorporated as Royal Holloway and Bedford New College, is a public university, public research university and a constituent college of the federal University of London. It has six schools, ...

Athens School of Fine Arts The Athens School of Fine Arts (ASFA; el, Ανωτάτη Σχολή Καλών Τεχνών, ΑΣΚΤ, literally: Highest School of Fine Arts), is Greece's premier Art school whose main objective is to develop the artistic talents of its students. ...

Buckinghamshire New University , mottoeng = By Art and Industry , established = 2007 – gained university status 1891 – Science and Art School , type = Public , staff = , chancellor = Jay Blades , vice_chancellor = Nick Braisby , st ...

, and the Athens Museum of Queer Arts. In 2020, they co-curated the conference "Psychoanalysis and Post-Truth" at the

Freud Museum The Freud Museum in London is a museum dedicated to Sigmund Freud, located in the house where Freud lived with his family during the last year of his life. In 1938, after escaping Nazi annexation of Austria he came to London via Paris and st ...

in London, in partnership with Waiting Times - a multi-stranded research project on the temporalities of healthcare funded by

The Wellcome Trust The Wellcome Trust is a charitable foundation focused on health research based in London, in the United Kingdom. It was established in 1936 with legacies from the pharmaceutical magnate Henry Wellcome (founder of one of the predecessors of Glaxo ...

. The conference presented the work of contemporary thinkers including

Yannis Stavrakakis Yannis Stavrakakis ( el, Γιάννης Σταυρακάκης; born 1970) is a Greek–British political theorist. A member of the Essex School of discourse analysis, he is mainly known for his explorations of the importance of psychoanalytic the ...

Renata Salecl Renata Salecl (born 1962) is a Slovene philosopher, sociologist and legal theorist. She is a senior researcher at the Institute of Criminology, Faculty of Law at the University of Ljubljana, and holds a professorship at Birkbeck College, Univ ...

Richard Seymour Richard Vershaun Seymour (born October 6, 1979) is an American professional poker player and former professional football player who was a defensive end in the National Football League (NFL) . He played college football College footbal ...

, Disnovation and

ContraPoints Natalie Wynn (born October 21, 1988) is an American YouTuber, political commentator, and cultural critic. She is best known for her YouTube channel, ContraPoints, where she creates video essays exploring a wide range of topics such as politics ...

Opera

In 2020, they were commissioned by the

Greek National Opera The Greek National Opera ( el, Εθνική Λυρική Σκηνή, ''Ethniki Lyriki Skini'') is the country's state lyric opera company, located in the Stavros Niarchos Foundation Cultural Center at the south suburb of Athens, Kallithea. It is a ...

to direct a version of

Monteverdi Claudio Giovanni Antonio Monteverdi (baptized 15 May 1567 – 29 November 1643) was an Italian composer, choirmaster and string player. A composer of both secular and sacred music, and a pioneer in the development of opera, he is considered ...

L'Orfeo ''L'Orfeo'' ( SV 318) (), sometimes called ''La favola d'Orfeo'' , is a late Renaissance/early Baroque ''favola in musica'', or opera, by Claudio Monteverdi, with a libretto by Alessandro Striggio. It is based on the Greek legend of Orpheus, and ...

, but the premiere did not happen because of lockdown measures for the

COVID-19 Coronavirus disease 2019 (COVID-19) is a contagious disease caused by a virus, the severe acute respiratory syndrome coronavirus 2 (SARS-CoV-2). The first known case was COVID-19 pandemic in Hubei, identified in Wuhan, China, in December ...

epidemic. In 2021, the opera was shot as a film titled ORFEAS2021 and will be premiered at the 62nd Thessaloniki Festival. The opera is about the struggles of Orfeas, the first gay prime minister of Greece, against a history of oppression in the “land of heroes.” It is dedicated to the memory of activist Zackie Oh! Vice said of it "the first queer opera in Greece speaks about the dark side of our society" and

Anouchka Grose Anouchka Grose (born 1970 in Sydney, Australia) is a British-Australian Lacanian psychoanalyst and writer.Liz Hoggard, Evening Standard, 11 February 2010. Careers Before training as a psychoanalyst, she studied Fine Art at Goldsmiths' College ...

said it is "both an emotional slap and a powerful piece of political polemic".

List of exhibitions and events

* 2012 On Being Sane in Sunny Places, Panke, Berlin * 2013 Τα Τρωκτικά / The Great Garbie, Embros Theatre, Athens * 2013 Fyta Bianella, Athens Biennale 4, Athens * 2014 ΦΥΤΙΝΗ ιβέντ 1, Coo Cafe Bar, Thessaloniki * 2014 Instant Psyconalysis, Apiary Studios, London * 2014 Enjoy (y)our State of Emergency, nGBK, Berlin * 2014 Sound::Gender::Feminism::Activism, London. College of Communication * 2015 Sound Acts I, KET, Athens * 2015 Twisting C(r)ash, Le Commune, Geneva * 2016 Queertafios, Athens Museum of Queer Arts * 2016 A Politics of Lies, Circuits & Currents, Athens * 2016 Twisting C(r)ash II, Romantso, Athens * 2016 Sound Acts II, KET, Athens * 2016 Rita Sue project, Athens School of Fine Arts * 2016 Lemonopita, Lage Egal, Berlin * 2016 Hypnos Project, Onassis Cultural Centre, Athens * 2016 Conceptual Song-Writing & Object-Oriented Synthesis, Athens Museum of Queer Arts * 2016 Technology & Transformations, Buckinghamshire New University, High Wycombe * 2016 The Equilibrists, New Museum & Benaki Museum, Athens (resigned) * 2016 Zuckerschock!, P71, Berlin * 2016 Deep Trash: Greek Trash, Bethnal Green Working Men’s Club, London * 2017 Queer : Unqueer, Atopos cvc (International Museum Day), Athens * 2017 The Death of Queer, Athens Festival Peiraios 260 * 2017- (ongoing) The ABC of FYTA, podcast, Spotify * 2017 Sound Acts III, Athens & Epidaurus Festival * 2017 5 Years of FYTA, Atopos cvc residency, Athens * 2017 Resurrection with Documena, Baggeion Hotel, Athens * 2017 Laboratorium Research vol. 2, Gdańska Galeria Miejska, Gdansk * 2017-8 Waiting for the Barbarians, Athens Biennale * 2018 Cabaret Negatif, Athens Biennale (cancelled) * 2018 Queer Approaches to Lena Platonos, Greek National Opera, Athens * 2018 The Real Athens Queer DIY, Berlin Porn Film Festival, 2018 * 2018 The Garden of Dystopian Pleasures, Athens School of Fine Arts * 2018 Glam Slam! Cabaret Voltaire, Athens * 2018 Borderline Offensive, House of Humour, Sofia (resigned) * 2018 Memes and Online Discourse in Greece, Atopos cvc, Athens * 2018 Pokémon Poetry, Atopos cvc, Athens * 2019 The Social Contract & Its Discontents, Athens School of Fine Arts * 2019 Athens Festival of Queer Performance, Feminist Autonomous Centre for Research, Athens * 2019 Euronoize, The Scala, London * 2020 200 Hundred Years of Suffocation, Online Festival * 2020 Psychoanalysis & Post-Truth, Freud Museum, London * 2020-21 ORFEAS2020/ORFEAS2021, Greek National Opera, Athens * 2021 Gardening, Zoumboulakis Gallery, Athens

References

{{reflist Performance artist collectives Greek contemporary artists Art movements