Sheffield Fringe

Selini Halvadaki

Selini Halvadaki (b. 1985) is a visual artist working primarily in the field of moving images. Her research-based work explores how image production takes part in creating our private and collective memory. She often works within a historical context of found footage mixed with new recordings in which moving images become a tool to initiate questions on the relationship between image production, historical narratives and identity. As part of her practice, Selini engages in collaborative projects and organizes exhibitions as a way to explore collaborative modes of production. She graduated from The Royal Danish Academy of Fine Arts in 2014. Previous exhibitions and festival participations include: Kino der Kunst, Munich (DE), VISIO: Outside the Black Box, Firenze (IT), CPH:DOX Copenhagen International Documentary Film Festival (DK), Images Film Festival, Toronto (CA), FOKUS Video Art Festival, Copenhagen (DK) and Athens International Short Film Festival (GR). www.selinihalvadaki.net

Off-History

Off-History | Denmark/Greece 2014 | HD | 19 min 11s

Selini Halvadaki’s video Off-History presents as its central ‘character’ an unfinished building located at the port of Piraeus, Greece’s main harbour. The ominous presence of this tall structure – abandoned during construction – sits with a sense of unease amongst the lively buildings of Piraeus. Searching for its history, the artist runs up against the “logic” of the archive. For the viewer, as for the artist, the building and its fragmented history appears only when the crutches of structure and logic are abandoned. We hear diverse voices suggesting what the building’s state of incompletion represents for them: it is a tomorrow that did not happen; it is democracy mismanaged; it is both the forgetting and the remembering of Junta. In Off-History, fragmentation has its very own unique way of presenting itself as a form of narrative. To those who are attuned, its agency is contingency.- M. Norouzi

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