Theodore Angelopoulos died on January 24th after being hit by a motorcycle in Athens
By Alexis Varouxakis*
I never really got a chance to properly thank you. Thank you for ‘Ulysses Gaze’, for ‘Landscape in the Mist’, for ‘The Travelling Players’ and for Eleni Karaindrou. On a more personal level, thank you for changing my life.
I was 19 when I came to work for a few months on the set of ‘Eternity and a Day’. It was the first time I was on a film set, the first time I met an actor. It was the first time I saw a production designer take a derelict house and transform it into a luxurious 19th century villa. And it was the first time that I got to work with a producer, a path I was to follow a few years later. The minute I set foot on the set, I felt at home. You and Mrs Phoebe made me feel welcome, you were both so gracious. ‘Eternity and a Day’ went on to win the ‘Palm d’Or’ at the Cannes Film Festival.
Since then you very kindly let me into your house and your family. I always felt welcome by you and the formidable Phoebe who I consider a second mother to me. You both gave me direction when I needed it. The most important thing you taught me, although indirectly, is to give back to the younger generation. Your door was always open for me, giving me advise, encouragement and guidance. It is a marvelous gift when someone who has reached the top takes the time to help the young.
I remember the conversations we had and with what intensity and focus you spoke. I always felt that you were never really present, or rather that you lived in two worlds. The material world had no meaning for you; you lived in the world of ideas, of dreams. It seemed to me that your body was only a vessel which allowed you to bring that other world, your real home, to this world. Your films, these images and moods you gave us, were part of that other world. And I know that there was so much more of that world that you wanted to show us.
I will never forget that summer day that changed me forever. You were setting up a shot on the beach. It was an ugly, deserted beach in the north of Greece. You put a few actors in the background and an actor with an accordion in the foreground and then.. and then you said ‘Action!’. Before my eyes something magical happened. This dead beach came to life. Out of nowhere you breathed life and color into something that was sad and void of life. Then time stopped. The sky opened and thunder struck me, electricity went through me and my hair stood on my body. It was at that moment that I said to myself: ‘I want to make films for the rest of my life’. It is to this day one of the most powerful experiences I have had. It is still what keeps me going today, that passion that was unleashed that summer day. For that and for everything else, thank you Mr Angelopoulos.
Alexis Varouxakis is a Hollywood based film producer
*Alexis Varouxakis is a Los Angeles based film producer. He is currently finishing post-production on ‘Dark Hearts’ a psychological thriller starring Kyle Schmid, Sonja Kinski, Lucas Till, Rachel Blanchard, Juliet Landau and Goran Visnjic. He has a number of films in development including ‘The Cure’ set in the Jazz world of 1950’s New Orleans. The film is inspired by the life of Chet Baker and Louis Armstrong.
Synapandema, the biggest gathering of Pontic Greeks in Australia, took place in Melbourne on January 20-22, 2012.
Organized by the Federation of Pontian Associations of Australia and the Pontiaki Estia of Melbourne, the three-day long event aims at promoting and maintaining the Pontian culture in the Antipodes.
The event this year was a gathering of joy and dancing, with attendees developing new contacts and meeting with relatives after many years apart.
The activities commenced on Friday, January 20, with the Registration Event for the enrollment of all participants and the information handout on the Synapandema programme in the hall of the Pontiaki Estia in Brunswick. On the same evening until late at night, the venue hosted the Hellenic Parakath, a traditional opening glenti with Pontian dances and music.
On Saturday, January 21, the Ypapanti Parish reception Centre hosted the Synapandema Ball, during which the vasilopita for the New Year was cut.
On Sunday, the participants enjoyed the rural beauties of Melbourne at Mornington Park with the Hellenic Community’s Panegyri in the afternoon and the Farewell Drinks free admission event later in the evening.
The events were attended by people from all three generations of Pontic Greeks and were created with impressive elements of the Pontic culture still surviving in Australia.
The new opera “The Barbarians”, produced by Hobart-based opera company IHOS and composed by artistic director Constantine Koukias, opened last week in Hobart as part of the Festival of Music and Art (FOMA). Based on the poem Waiting for the Barbarians, written by Greek Alexandrian poet Constantine Cavafy in 1904, the Opera is performed in Modern Greek with bilingual narration.
Throughout the production, stanzas of the poem were narrated in Greek and English followed by an explosion of artistic storytelling that includes singing, dancing, donkeys, fish, projections – everything the audience’s imagination can dream up.
MONA FOMA presents
The Barbarians
Based on a poem by Constantine Cavafy
Director: Constantine Koukias
Production Designers: Peta Heffernan & Elvio Brianese
Lighting & Special Effects: Jason James
Digital Video Production design: Carl Higgs
Sound Design: Greg Gurr
Music Director: Don Bate
Perucssion: Gary Wain, Tracey Patten
Bassoon / Contra bassoon: Simone Walters
Keyboards: Clarissa Zhang
Trumpet: Dee Boyd
Violin: Yue-Hong Cha
Drumming & Improvising: Jane Baker
Cast: Nicholas Dinopoulos, Grace Ovens, Ayrton Rose, Athanasia Houndalas, Christos Linou
Chorus: Daniel Cugliari, Callum Doyle–Scott, Oliver Gathercole, John Gunter, Tim Hurd, Jon Lenthell, Ben Peelman, Joshua Santospirito, Kyle Smith, and Zach Wells.
City Hall, Macquarie St, Hobart
January 18th–22nd 2012
More info at www.ihosopera.com
Come along with your family and friends to celebrate Meat-fare Sunday as a community. On this day begins the spiritual preparation for Lent, observed by Greek Orthodox believers by giving up meat products.
Lent is the period that the Church has designated for its followers’ spiritual growth through fasting, prayer and worship.
RSVP is preferable for catering purposes by 16 February, however, last minute deciders are still welcome. Please Call Dimitri Mavromatis or Elleni Comino on 38443669.
The Greek Orthodox Community (GOC) of NSW will hold a special event in memory of the recently deceased Greek filmmaker Theodoros Angelopoulos on February 12 at its suburban premises in Lakemba, at 17:00.
The event will include the screening of the first film ever created by Angelopoulos, “The Broadcast” (1968), while Dr. Vrasidas Karalis will comment on the overall work of the acclaimed Greek director and open a discussion with the audience.
Admission is free and everyone is invited to join the event and pay tribute to the internationally recognized artist, who has promoted Greek cinema culture around the world.
It must be noted that the Greek Film Festival in NSW has presented numerous films created by Angelopoulos in the past.
For more information contact the GOC offices at (02)-9750-0440.
‘Sympossio Greek Gourmet Touring’, lasting from the 30th of January until the 17th of February, is a journey of Greek gastronomy in the big cities of Europe. The aim of the event is the promotion of Greece through cuisine, nutrition and local products, in a vivid, experiential way.
The ‘Sympossio’ brings together a host of experts, including trade partners, to take part in a multi-dimensional experience. These include tourism representatives and a wider social mass: bodies of state, transportation, travel agents and tour operators, Greek producers, as well as representatives of local and international media.
The new title ‘Sympossio’ adds to the event’s cultural and historic continuity, as it continues a tradition which began in ancient Greek Symposiums. The principles of hospitality, entertainment and food, will be combined in a joint participatory process; cooking, eating and drinking in unison. This year’s journey of Greek gastronomy to the big cities of Europe relies on the strength of collectivity.
The event has been expanded and the 3rd Greek Gourmet Touring will visit 7 European countries and 15 cities: Berlin, Cologne, Frankfurt, Stuttgart, Munich, Salzburg, Zurich, Geneva, Lausanne, Lyon, Toulouse, Rome, Florence, Brussels, London.
The Hellenic Cultural Foundation branch in Berlin will be formally inaugurating a new exhibition entitled “No return” by Vangelis Tzermias on February 2, at 20:00.
Tzermias’ works give the traditional seascape genre a new jolt, which is characterized by expressionist tendencies. His ships sail on a quiet, yet more often hostile sea. Although some characters are visible on the sails, men are not the main focus of the artist’s work. The blue of the sea, the voyage of the ships, which toss back and forth, and the struggle of the masts against the wind serve as allegories and poesy in the paintings of Vangelis Tzermias.
“By clicking on memory, I reconstruct and explore anew the values of painting. The ones I can find nowhere else but in the unknown; there, where art shows me a new way of life” said Mr. Tzermias.
“The questions remain the same as always, unchanged in time and many times without answers. What is art? Is it the simplicity of the Parthenon, an abstract work of Rothko, a landscape of Turner, a human figure of Freud or a Duchamp’s urinal flush?” wonders the artist.
Vangelis Tzermias was born in 1960 in Crete. He graduated from the Accademia di Belle Arti in Florence in 1980 and continued his studies in painting at the Athens School of Fine Arts – ASFA (1980-1985) with Dimitris Mytaras and Ilias Dekoulakos. He has already presented 15 personal exhibitions and many joint ones. He currently lives and works at Markopoulos, Athens.
The governors of three Greek prisons, among them the high-security Korydallos jail in southwest Athens, are refusing to take more inmates as overcrowding is at dangerous levels.
Cramped conditions at the three jails, which also include Tripoli in southern Greece and Halkida in the north, pose a health and security risk and mean even temporary prisoners can’t be accepted.
In a joint letter to judicial authorities, the governors said they were unable to accommodate any more inmates “even temporarily due to excessively cramped conditions which pose a health and security risk”.
“There is no space anywhere except the bathrooms. We are closing because the prison is close to exploding”, Spyros Athanassiou, governor of the Halkida prison wrote.
Similar grievances were also expressed by Ioannis Anestis, the governor of Korydallos, which has seen a series of security breaches recently, including a hostage-taking last month. “We are unable to receive inmates due to the suffering and overcrowding of our institution,” he said. He noted that the prison was built to hold 800 people, but is currently housing more than 2,320.
Most Greek jails are filled to at least double their capacity, with more than 12,700 people behind bars throughout the country, almost half of them foreigners.
On the International Holocaust Remembrance Day on January 27, and the UN Department of Public Information briefing on Bulgaria’s unknown part in saving its Jewish population during WWII, the Central Board of Jewish Communities of Greece sent a letter to the UN body on January 26, reminding them of Bulgaria’s part in the Greek Jews’ Holocaust.
Although Bulgaria organized a campaign during WWII to save its Jewish population, the price paid was the deportation of 11,000 Greek Jews from Thrace and Macedonia, then controlled by Bulgaria.
“In the name of the historical memory of our brothers, victims of the Bulgarian atrocities in our country during the Holocaust, we ask you to include this small and ‘untold’ part of history in your briefing,” said the letter sent Jan. 26, according to novinite.com.
Despite the fact that Bulgaria was an Axis ally in WWII, the country managed to save the lives of about 50,000 Bulgarian Jews with the support of Bulgarian politicians and even Tsar Boris III.
Greek Prime Minister Lucas Papademos said negotiators had made “significant progress” in talks to strike a restructuring deal for Greek government debt, with the aim of reaching a definitive agreement by the end of this week.
“Significant progress has been made in talks about private sector involvement,” Papademos told reporters early on Tuesday, following a meeting with senior officials from the European Central Bank and the EU after an EU leaders’ summit.
“We are seeking to conclude negotiations with the troika by the end of the week,” he said, referring to the team of analysts from the ECB, the European Commission and the International Monetary Fund, who are responsible for monitoring Greece’s progress in meeting budget deficit targets.
Papademos said the major sticking points to be agreed upon with the troika regarded deeper spending cuts and labor market reforms.
Those commitments, together with a deal with private sector bondholders to take a 50 percent face-value writedown on the near 200 billion euros ($264 billion) of Greek bonds they hold, are necessary before the troika can sign off on a second rescue package for Greece.
The Greek Orthodox Community (GOC) of NSW will hold a special event in memory of the recently deceased Greek filmmaker Theodoros Angelopoulos on February 12 at its suburban premises in Lakemba, at 17:00.
On the International Holocaust Remembrance Day on January 27, and the UN Department of Public Information briefing on Bulgaria’s unknown part in saving its Jewish population during WWII, the Central Board of Jewish Communities of 
