Janis Rafailidou (also known as Janis Rafa), born in Greece 1984, is an artist engaging with sculpture, video art and film. She was recently featured in the 59th International Art Exhibition La Biennale di Venezia with her 2020 short film Lacerate, and her work has been acquired by various institutions, such as Centraal Museum, Stedelijk Museum, and Fondazione in Between Art Film. Her solo exhibition at the iconic Eye Filmmuseum 2023, showcased videos, films and large-scale sculptures, establishing her practice in the dichotophy of art and film.
Life and work In 2012 Rafailidou obtained a PhD in Fine Art at the University of Leeds. Between 2013 and 2014, she was a resident at the Rijksakademie and in 2020 she was awarded a fellowship at ARTWORKS by S. Niarchos Foundation. It was during her residency at the Dutch Rijksakademie that she began shifting her focus from video art to film. She is now living and working between Athens and Amsterdam. Her debut feature film, Kala azar, 2020 premiered and awarded at IFFR and New Directors/ New Films at Moma.
Selected works
2010 Dad Where Are You? I Thought I Found You But I Was Looking on Footage of a Different Country I Thought I Found You, Dad Where Are You?
2012 Exit K1 The title of this film refers to a road exit in the outskirts of Athens (GR), "Exit K1", that leads away from the city, onto a dirt road. There, clandestine migrants travel "invisibly", avoiding the immediate metropolitan area. The work explores the reality of Greek periphery through the citizens' perspective.
2013 Three Farewells This piece consists of three videos shot in 4K, 2.40:1 with stereo sound, namely: Father Gravedigger (20’); Our Dead Dogs (17’); The Last Burial (25’). The trilogy evades anthropocentric conceptions of death, mourning and melancholia, framing them in a post-human narrative. Each video narrates a burial, exploring the common vulnerability and shared pain between humans and non-humans. The work exemplifies Rafalidou's cinematic narrative as characterised by a realism suspended between personal impression and actuality. Our Dead Dogs Father Gravedigger The Last Burial 8 Kilos of Garden
2014 Requiem to a Shipwreck A Sign of Prosperity to the Dreamer Gravediggers
2015 Configuration of the Man Who Has Seen Without Being Seen Requiem to a Fatal Incident Winter Came Early
2016 Untitled There She Blows The Thin Crust of Earth Covers
2018 Take 11: What Remains Is a Wound Disembodied Covers, Footplates#1–2 Another 10kg of Garden
2019 Take 11 (installation) Verism#1–5 In the Flat Field #5818 Verism#2–5 Another 10kg of Garden, and Another 15 kg of Garden (We Know This is A.)
2020 Kala Azar The protagonists of Kala Azar are a couple that works in an animal crematorium and illegally cremate roadkill animals. The film is set in a surrealist universe created by Rafalidou and filled with landscapes, animals, living and dead bodies. Kala Azar has participated in thirty-eight film festivals, among which the 49th International Film Festival Rotterdam and the Hong Kong International Film Festival (2020), receiving a total of nine awards. Lacerate
2021 Waiting for Time to Pass I Am the Daughter of a Sheep
Selected exhibitions
2015
Palazzo Strozzi
2016
Janis Rafa and The Fear of Leaving the Animal Forever Forgotten Under the Ground, EYE Filmmuseum (Amsterdam, NL), from 2016 to 2021.
2017
Kunsthalle Munster Centre d'Art Contemporaine Chanot Palazzo Medici Riccardi
2018
Mardin Biennial Manifesta 12
2019
[solo-exhibition] Eaten by Non-Humans, Centraal Museum (Utrecht, NL), from 2019 to 2020.
2020 MAXXI State of Concept Athens
2021 Bucharest Biennial Goethe-Institut (GR, 2021)
2022 The Milk of Dreams, Venice Biennale
2022 [solo-exhibition] Feed Me. Eat Me. Cheat Me., Eye Filmmuseum
References