Category: CULTURE

News about culture and cultural heritage

(Un)learning from Athens: documenta 14 Inauguration

Surprise and subversion of the spectator expectations. The vision of Adam Szymczyk, Artistic Director of documenta 14, starts to unravel, calling the public to “unlearn what they know”. On April 8, documenta 14 opened its exhibition in Athens. Extending over the city in more than 40 different public institutions, squares, cinemas, university locations, and libraries, over 160 international artists will show works newly conceived for documenta 14. The exhibition will take place in Athens till July 16 and in Kassel, Germany, from June 10 to September 17.

For the first time, the prestigious contemporary art exhibition with a sharp political profile opens in a city other than Kassel, where it has been held every five years since 1955. “Learning from Athens” is the title of documenta 14. “What did we learn from Athens? That we all must abandon our prejudices and plunge into the darkness of not knowing. We started with these steps three years ago, preparing documenta 14 in Athens and we got here, at the opening,” Adam Szymczyk said at a press conference in Athens on Thursday, April 6, which was attended by more than 2.000 journalists , artists, curators and collectors from around the world.

The program starts with the official opening at the National Museum of Contemporary Art (EMST) on Saturday, by German President Frank-Walter Steinmeier, following an invitation by President Prokopis Pavlopoulos.

Among the events of documenta 14 inauguration week program is the music performance of Henryk Górecki, Symphony No. 3, Op. 36, Symphony of Sorrowful Song, by Ross Birrell and David Harding, with Athens State Orchestra and Syrian Expat Philharmonic Orchestra (SEPO) at the Athens Concert Hall (20.30). The music performance is a co-production of documenta 14, The Athens State Orchestra, and the Athens Concert Hall and part of the event’s proceeds will benefit the initiative of the Athens State Orchestra’s “Pink Box” for refugee children as well as the programs of Doctors Without Borders (MSF) for refugees both within and beyond Greek borders. Szymczyk emphasized, on the occasion of this performance the feelings of loss, separation and despair that parents and children undergo in times of war.

The performance of Jani Christou’ s Epicycle, 1968–2017, part of which was performed by the organizational team of documenta 14 to open the Press Conference, will take place Saturday morning at theAthens Conservatoire (ΩA.2) and all other venues, while a performance by Nikhil Chopra titled “Drawing a Line through Landscape” will be held at Archimedous Street 15 (Moschato) and will continue on Sunday.

(www.greeknewsagenda.gr)

April 30, 2017
New Pyramid Discovered in Egypt

After thousands of years, researchers are still making incredible finds in Egypt (case in point, the giant statue unearthed in Cairo last month). Now, researchers have made another big find: earlier this week the Egyptian Ministry of Antiquities announced that a team of their archaeologists discovered the remains of pyramid dating back to the 13th Dynasty, which ruled about 3,700 years ago reports the Associated Press. The only problem is that an inscription indicates that the pyramid may have been built for a ruler that already has a pyramid next door.

The Egypt Independent reports that the remains were uncovered at the Dahshur Necropolis, an area about 25 miles south of Cairo on the west bank of the Nile. That area is home to what is considered to be some of the earliest pyramids including Sneferu’s Bent Pyramid and Red Pyramid.

While the pyramid-shaped upper section is gone, the substructure still remains. “The uncovered remains of the pyramid represents a part of its inner structure, which is composed of a corridor leading to the inner side of the pyramid and a hall, which leads to a southern ramp and a room to the western end,” Adel Okasha, the director general of the Dahshur Necropolis says in a statement, reports Owen Jarus at LiveScience.

Though the writing on the slab has not been translated by the Antiquities Ministry, Jarus shared images of the hieroglyphics with Egyptologists. He reports that two have said the writing is a religious text often used inside pyramids, and that the text appears to include the name of the pharaoh Ameny Qemau, the fifth king of Dynasty XIII, who briefly ruled around 1790 B.C.

That raises some questions, however, since Ameny Qemau’s pyramid was discovered in Dahshur in 1957, Aidan Dodson, a research fellow at the University of Bristol who has written about artifacts from that earlier pyramid, tells Jarus. He suggests one possibility for the discrepancy is that Qemau may have hacked out the name of a predecessor king and inserted his own name. That practice was common in the ancient world when a new ruler wanted to bury the memory of an enemy or unpopular ruler.

The AP reports that the Ministry of Antiquities plans to continue excavations and hope to find more evidence of which ruler or high-ranking official the pyramid belonged to.
(www.smithsonianmag.com)

April 30, 2017
4th century imperial bath complex inaugurated in Egypt’s Alexandria

Egyptian Minister of Antiquities Khaled El-Enany and members of parliment inaugurated Alexandria’s cistern and imperial bathing complex area in the Kom El-Dikka archaeological site.

The area had been undergoing excavation and restoration since 1960 by an Egyptian-Polish mission from Warsaw University.

Mahmoud Afifi, head of the ministry’s Ancient Egyptian Antiquities Department, said that the newly inaugurated area will be included within the Kom Al-Dikka tourist path, which includes the Roman amphitheater, the bird villa and residential houses from the Hellenistic period until the Islamic era.

El-Enany describes the bathing complex as “one of the finest edifices of its time,” and that the bathing halls had welcomed hundreds of bathers at a time.

The complex also includes palestrae for physical exercises, colonnade passages and amenities such as public latrines.

Water was supplied to the complex using huge cisterns and heated by a complex system of furnaces and pipes.

The minister and the parlimentary delegates also paid a visit to the planned Mosaic museum in downtown Alexandria to inspect the ongoing work and address any obstacles to its completion.

During the tour, Mohamed Abdelmaguid, director-general of the Underwater Archaeological Department, introduced a three-phase plan to develop the Qayet Bey Citadel and its surroundings.

Abdelmaguid also reviewed a plan for the construction of the first underwater museum beneath the city’s eastern harbour, which once was the ancient Alexandria royal area.

Abdelmaguid suggests the building of an underwater park to promote diving as well as the establishment of a training centre for underwater archaeology.

(english.ahram.org.eg)

April 20, 2017
6 archeological missions to resume underwater excavations in Egypt

Six local and international excavation missions have obtained the necessary approvals to resume their underwater archeological excavations for antiquities along the shores of Alexandria and Red Sea governorates, according to the Department of Underwater Antiquities in the Ministry of Antiquities.

The head of the department, Mohamed Abdel Maguid, said the missions submitted their papers for approval in December in an effort to be ready before April. Only two of the six missions will resume work next month, he added.

The first of these two missions is the French Le Centre d’études Alexandrines (CEAlex), headed by Isabelle Hairy. This mission will complete its work in Fort Qaitbay by May 20. The second is the Egyptian mission which will work along Red Sea coasts from April 15 until May 7, headed by Mohamed Mostafa.

Maguid said the other four missions have asked for the commencement of their work to be delayed until fall. These include Frank Goddio with the European Institute of Underwater Antiquities in France; Harry E. Tzalas with the Institute of Hellenic Underwater Archaeology in Greece; Galina A. Belova with the Russian Institute for Archaeology and Egyptology Studies; and Paolo Gallo with Turin University in Italy.

(www.egyptindependent.com)

April 20, 2017