The Travels of the Outward Turn Program: January – February 2025

Christiana Kosiari’s new year is launched in New York – at one of the most important North American festivals. Her performance piece “RUNWAY,” which premiered during the Onassis Dance Days 2024 at the Onassis Stegi, is presented at the 20th edition of the premier annual festival of experimental theater Under The Radar, on January 10, 11, 13, and 14. Under The Radar (UTR) Festival features cutting-edge performances from around the world and across the US. It aims to embody global citizenship, foster innovation, and provide a stage for new voices.

In parallel, “TECHNE,” an exhibition with four large-scale digital artworks brought to life by generative AI, real-time interactive displays, and immersive sound, is organized as part of Under The Radar (UTR) and curated by Onassis ONX. The four exhibits will be presented from January 4 to 19 in New York, in a production actualized by the Onassis Stegi, Brooklyn Academy of Music (BAM), and Under the Radar (UTR) Festival.

It all started in March 2023, at the Onassis Dance Days 2023. Ever since, the choreographer and performer Chara Kotsaki’s well-traveled solo physical and sound performance “to be possessed” has followed a long successful trajectory, touring around important Greek and international dance festivals. On January 17 and 18, Kotsali will attempt a new trial possession at the POLE-SUD CDCN L’année commence avec elles festival in Strasbourg. Through a disarticulated staged ritual, the choreographer crystallizes human existence as something that transcends the boundaries of the human as an individual, poetically revealing the ways in which language and social norms “possess” our body and spirit, both literally and metaphorically.

Chara Kotsali is a 2024–25 Onassis AiR Fellow, through the Dramaturgy Fellowship program.

A work on the borders of performance, dance, and the isual arts. “Lapis Lazuli,” a performance we got to meet at the Main Stage of the Onassis Stegi last April, continues its successful tour around world theaters. From January 17–19, Euripides Laskaridis and the OSMOSIS team land at South America’s greatest performance art festival: Santiago a Mil International Festival at Santiago de Chile’s Teatro Teatro Municipal de Las Condes – the same place where five years ago, in January 2020, Nikos Karathanos presented their own approach to “The Birds” by Aristophanes. They will then make a stop in Helsinki, Finland, at Espoo Theater, from February 6–8, and then in Florence, Italy, at Teatro della Pergola, from February 20–22.

Christos Papadopoulos travels to London’s Sadler’s Wells with “Larsen C” on February 4 and 5, continuing the performance’s successful tour for the fourth year in a row. Last year, Sadler’s Wells, one of the most important and innovative dance theaters in Europe, announced that Christos Papadopoulos was among the four nominees for the Rose International Dance Prize; this year we eagerly await not only the presentation of this work but also the announcement of the winner. “Larsen C” is an homage to the silent transitions our bodies undergo, as well as the ways they are integrated or set apart, revealing their dynamics within a wider collective becoming.

Ioanna Paraskevopoulou adds another station to the artistic map of the Onassis Stegi’s “Outward Turn” program. Having already conquered some of the largest European stages, the distinguished choreographer will travel to the Théâtre de la Bastille in Paris with their well-traveled awarded piece titled “MOS,” from February 10–12. “MOS” was presented for the first time during the Onassis New Choreographers Festival 9 – ONC 9 at the Upper Stage of the Onassis Stegi in March 2022. The piece is a duet where the choreographer herself and her co-dancer Giorgos Kotsifakis enter into discourse with a disparate series of images and seek to impart their own transcription in space.

It started as a friendly chat between Giannis Aggelakas and Olia Lazaridou. It premiered at the Onassis Stegi last December, it went sold-out, turned into a book, traveled to Amsterdam, and now it’s staged in Thessaloniki. “Nekyia”, created by the legend of the Greek rock music scene Giannis Aggelakas and the revelatory sensation of European choreography Christos Papadopoulos, travels for three shows from the Main Stage of the Onassis Stegi to the Thessaloniki Concert Hall, from February 14–16. A mystic descent into the Underworld that was created to immerse us in life.