Salt, here, is more than material, it symbolizes a cycle: the breaking down of matter into elemental form, purification, and reintegration. In our tears, as in our bodies, salt lingers like a trace of the ocean we carry within us.
The project employs diverse media and material expressions of salt architectural salt bricks, Dead Sea cubes, industrial road salt alongside performative gestures inspired by the traditional practices of mastic cultivation. The installation becomes a space where material, gesture, and memory flow into one another—blurring the lines between human and elemental, past and present. In this convergence, connections emerge between material processes and embodied experience, echoing gestures of care, repetition, and transformation.
The exhibition ‘Αλς - Als’ consisted of:
A floor of 100KG of road salt. 50KG Saltbricks.
Ceiling Projection: Mastic tree - Chios 2021 Special credits: Eftychia Sarri
Floor projection: Body and salt bricks - Berlin 2022 Special credits: Anabelle Paran
Overhead Projection: Moon projection made out of: salt crystals, Salt cubes from the Dead Sea, and a sieve basket.
Salt brick sculptures.
Small screen: 3 video compositions Large screen: The “Gathering” film Credits: Anabelle Paran, Zane Prater, Sophie Peters, Eloise Gillow.
The audience was free to interact with the installation space on the second day of the exhibition.
1st Performance :
The work evolves with a performative activation of the space. The space shifts and overlaps through live camera, projection, live sound and live visuals. Performed by Nasia Papavasiliou and the Guest artists Katarzyna Debska https://www.katarzynadebska.com (v-jaying and performance) and the live sound of Jerzy Maczynski. https://jerzymaczynski.com
Special credits: Chios island videos: Eftychia Sarri Grunewald Forest videos: Jerzy Maczynski, Katarzyna Debska Kreuzberg: Anabelle Paran
2nd Performance: Performed by the artist. De-activation of the space. The Last Phase of the work.
Funded by Cyprus Ministry of Culture