Questioning the physicality of space and the meaning of an object within its relation to a viewer, I tend to intertwine the viewer’s visual memory and imagination by repeating previous moments of an experience. The architectonic theatre features various objects and [theatro] expands on the notion of ‘view’ (‘thea’ in Greek, where the word ‘theatre’ comes from). The word ‘view’ is also the root of the word ‘theory’ [coming from the junction of the words ’thea’(=view) and ‘oro’( =to perceive)]. Intending the theory as practice, Ι composed [theatro] as an act of theory, asking ‘Does a de-construction of a composition inquire or does it request a knowledge of the past?’

[theatro] is a rhythmical reading experience, a 5.5 meters long transcript of a seminar performance reflecting it’s original pulse and duration. It is based on the seminar performance “PUZZLE”, that took place at FROWN, Athens initiated by Maria Lalou, consisted of Katerina Drakopoulou [A], Maro Zacharogianni [B], Maria Lalou [O], Mirrored Glass Object [X] and a live-feed camera. In this work Maria Lalou uses two software platforms for writing. Powerpoint for the pre-fabricated text and a live performed text on ‘Word’, both projected on the screen from her computer. [theatro] is verbatim transcription of the piece with several functions. Next to the documentation of the PUZZLE performance and a manual reading, it also serves as a script for the play, ‘I AM A ‘Φ’.

During the book launch in Motto Lalou will introduce the work with the lecture performance ‘theatre of consciousness’ a work based on a critical text that Lalou has written in 2013 for the academic press ‘activate’ published in London prior to the idea of [theatro]. The performance’ theatre of consciousness refers to the seen and the seer through an analysis that places the audience in a central position and as a core thematic of ‘the seen’.

[theatro] is published by Onomatopee launched primary in Eindhoven at Lalou’s solo exhibition ‘a spect’ during June 2015. The publication is designed in collaboration with Yin Yin Wong/Werkplats and includes an introduction to the work by Alena Alexandrova.

[theatro] leporello will be installed in its full length from the 19th November in the vitrines of Motto accessed through the public space. Lalou is producing a limited edition of prints of the floor plan ‘archetype’ which is one of her basic tools for this series of work, to will be installed in the exhibition space.

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Maria Lalou is an artist born in Athens in 1977. She works with the science of objects – containers, spatial installations, film and accumulated performances, developing context as of extensions of architecture. Lalou’s specialization at glass science has been evolving in contextualizing aspects of mass / surface / space/ time /duration in the sphere of cognition by challenging the bodily experience and questioning alignment of the vertical and horizontal, disposition and disorientation. She graduated from the Gerrit Rietveld Academie in Fine Arts and from Technical University of Athens in Architecture, Design of Space – Object and Constructive Arts. She has been researcher at DasArts Amsterdam and an invited resident in e- mobilArt program for Interactive Artists. Lalou’s works have been shown amongst others in the Contemporary Art Museum of Thessaloniki during the 2nd Biennale of Thessaloniki, in ‘Technopolis’ Industrial Museum of Athens and at ‘Living Spaces’-2nd Contemporary Art Festival in Damascus, ‘Manobra’ Festival in Sao Paolo Brazil. She has been in collaboration with institutions as the E-Engineering of the Hogeschool of Amsterdam as an external adviser, with Roehampton Univesity in London as a writer on a post academic journal and an invited lecturer by Rijksacademie Studios in Amsterdam in 2012. For more info visit: http://reaction-lalou.com

This book sets out to present photo portraits and life stories that conclude with recipe suggestions intended to inspire the reader. The book’s aim is achieved when – by cooking and eating the suggested dish – the reader ingests the Other in a unusual and unexpected ‘transubstantiation’. Strangers, usually just glimpsed, here become trusted ma.tres d’h.tel who – if they don’t poison you – give you the opportunity to look deeper into their worlds by telling you about their lives. Urban anthropophagy: allowing people to enter you through their food; letting them inside you by looking at them and listening to what they have to say. This book also offers itself up as an informal guide to London, where the city and its hustle and bustle stand in sharp relief to people’s memories. A guide where a suburban backstreet may be as meaningful as Big Ben in the quest to understand the city, and where the real difference lies in the people we meet and the tales they tell of this vast metropolis teeming with human life. It is a guide book that invites you to take wrong turnings and a cookbook that says it is okay to accept recipes from strangers.

Elia Romanelli
Anthropologist and project director

€20.00

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A collection of Peter Downsbrough publications ranging from 1975 to 2015 is now available at Motto. The collection includes ‘Position’, an inclusive monograph on the work of Peter Downsbrough.

Available on our online shop

This book is an unconventional autobiography. It retraces one year in the life of Rob Pruitt through the quotidian objects that the artist once loved, consumed, then felt he didn’t need anymore. An extension of the real-world flea markets, that he has been organizing since the early 1990’s, this particular collection of belongings sold on eBay from September 23 2013- September 23 2014 unearths precious fragments of Pruitt’s life while revealing his most material desires.

€20.00

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A series of portraits of teen idols of the 80’s and early 90’s in Silvia Prada’s classic monochromatic nostalgia-meets pop art manifestos. Prada playfully chronicles cultural iconography with the ardent reverence of a teen fan mixed with the obsession to detail of an anthropologist and the refined hand of an expressive illustrator. Generation X’s celebration of this golden age is a fantastical glimpse into our past and an early grappling with stardom and popular culture long before the digital era.

This publication is the fourth in a series of artist books dedicated to b/w portraits.

Published by Triangle Books. Brussels

€ 18.00

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Arts For Living takes a close look at the abrons arts center, a community art facility in the lower east side, as a case study for an architecture designed to address issues of public space and community life. the center was built during the 1970’s fiscal crisis and designed by prentice and chan, ohlhausen as a cultural institution with new educational facilities intended to enable, foster and serve the everyday activities of the local low-income population.

with essays by alan moore and kim förster, an interview with lo-yi chan and photographs by jason fulford.

designed by geoff han

printed by drukkerij mart.spruijt bv, amsterdam

€25.00

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The “Jewellery Hyperreal” publication on the question how jewellery could be transferred into hyperreality

includes interviews with Daniel Knorr, Yukinori Maeda, Schmidttakahashi, Magnus Ericson, Lisa Walker, Yu Yamada

and a special contribution by Akio Seki

Edition of 500
Designed by THe Simple Society

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Since 1997 the artist and jewellery designer Susan Pietzsch installed with Schmuck2 a continous international exhibition programme. Schmuck2 takes a focus on unusual, diverse takes on the themes of “jewellery”, combining people with different cultural background such as artists, designers and art-theorists. The projects shape a multi-faced image for contemporary styles of jewellery, using unconventional concepts that move between fine and applied arts.

€12.00

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Kirsten Palz, 100 Works (2007-2014)

Read by Erik Steinbrecher

€25.00

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Design: Ott Metusala. Advisor: Janice McNab. Amsterdam 2015

€8.00

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Excavating the sky gathered architects, filmmakers, and activists from Syria and the Arab World with a series of events focused on Syria and the production of its contemporary landscape from before WWI till today. 
Its main focus was to present a “displaced pavilion” in Syria, a well recently dug in an undisclosed location in Syria currently providing water for a community of 15,000 people.

€28.00

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