Memoriam Walking Festival invites the residents and visitors of the island to walk together and experience artistic works in the old town of Lefkada. From the 8th to the 18th of July 2022, visual works, narratives, soundscapes, musical compositions will be presented on the topic of the oral history of the island and the meaning of the place in general. The festival will take place in the historical center of Lefkada, in the public space, in historical buildings, museums and traditional houses (Old Courts, Orpheus Museum Courtyard, Dionysias Vlachos House, Philharmonic Square, Marka Square, Sikelianou Square).
In particular, it presents the results of the artistic projects Topos:Lefkada και Memoriam | the Museum of Memory and invites visitors to an interactive walk in the old town of Lefkada.
During the last 2 years the workshops were held with the participation of people with more or less previous artistic experience. The coordinators and participants approached, with different methods and tools – such as mapping,
photography, sound, visual narration, theater, walking – the concepts of place, memory, history, home. Inspired by Lefkada, they worked with various means of expression and theoretical approaches and created narratives, representations and sensory compositions with references to the social, cultural and aesthetic characteristics of various places and spaces and their relations with them.
The curation of the exhibition is also a result of the last workshop, in which the participants proposed ways and locations for the exhibited works, that aim to create a dialogue with the town of Lefkada and its everyday life. The presence of the artworks in the public space, and in some private interior spaces, shapes a route in the town. The selected spots / stops in this route create conceptual and emotional connections among the artworks and the use of the surrounding spaces. So, the exhibition invites a wider audience – that includes all those walking in the specific space – to participate and experience the artworks outside the places that are strictly defined as art spaces.

Memoriam Walking Festival
A walking art exhibition in the city of Lefkada

Walking, or rather wandering, as a foundational element of this exhibition, can be imagined as an activity in which someone will be able “to see and to think over the sights, to assimilate the new into the known” (Rebecca Solnit, Wanderlust: A History of Walking, 2000). The visitors need to cross a distance in order to go from one spot to the next which can be perceived as a vast kinesthetic experience. By following the specific route, or by inventing their own, they are invited to think of possible connections between the exhibits and their environment, and to participate in suggested activities. A digital mapping of the exhibition gives the option to experience the exhibition differently and makes it accessible to people who may not be able to physically attend. The digital format will continue in the future and will be open to the public for proposals regarding its enrichment and the preservation of the
collective memory of the city of Lefkada.

The exhibition presents the results of the workshops:
Memoriam – The Museum of Memory by Dafni Kalafati & Photini Papahatzi
Place as Visual Narrative by Myrto Papadopoulos
Place as Memory by Dafni Kalafati
Place as Sound by Andromachi Vrakatseli
Place as Home by Photini Papahatzi
In situ by Dimitra Kondylatou

Participants:
Platon Aderfopoulos, Maria Agisilaou, Pantelis Abouchanis, Panagiota Anastasopoulou, Konstantina Avdikou, Marilia Bouranta, Nikos Ferentinos, Leon Fragkoulis, Giorgos Gavagias, Nikolaos Iatras, Kaiti Kakavouli, Panos Kaltsas, Anastasia Kapretsou, Vaso Karagiozoudi, Thodoris Karamintzos, Ioanna Kontou, Marilena Koutroumpanou, Aggelos Kotsiras, Anastasia Livitsanou, Flora – Chrysi Malla, Georgia Mantalia, Irini – Afendra Bosinaki, Katerina Nakou, Ioanna Oikonomou, Vasilis Panagiotou, Irini Pantazi, Alexandra Pantou, Eleni Pantou, Anastasios Papadatos, Angelika Papadopoulou, Eleni Pavlidou, Gerasimos Perdikaris, Thanasis Pilafas, Evi Politi, Eleonora Poulia, Konstantinos Psathas, Natassa Remoundou, Andreas Robotis, Vasilis Sentzas, Nikoleta Siapera, Anastasia Skiada, Domenico Soula, Marilena Spanoudaki, Konstantinos Stamatelos, Despoina Stamatellou, Giannis Tsepos, Christos Vichas, Dionysia Vlachou, Vrakatseli Andromachi

The International Symposium Walking Practices: art, social action and oral history is organised in the framework of the Memoriam Walking Festival on the 10th of July 2022. Κey aspects of walking as a cultural practice will be analyzed on topics such as the evolution of walking through visual media, the use of locative media, the relationship between art and

intangible cultural heritage in the urban space, the walking interview in relation to soundscape and oral history, art and walking, writing and thinking.

Memoriam Walking Festival is supported by the Stavros Niarchos Foundation Public Humanities Initiative (SNFPHI) in Columbia University. The workshops took place in 2020-2021 with the support of the Ministry of Culture and Sports.