Klonaris / Thomadaki, Double Labyrinth, 1975–1976
Klonaris / Thomadaki
Double Labyrinth

Maria Klonaris (*1950 †2014, Greece, France) studied visual art and English literature in Athens as well as Egyptology, film, art history and philosophy in Paris. Katerina Thomadaki (*1949, Greece, France) studied literature and philosophy in Athens and theatre studies and philosophy in Paris. Since 1975, they have been working together in Paris, creating a multifaceted oeuvre (film, performance, photography, sound art and multimedia installations). In 1977 they published their Manifeste pour une féminité radicale pour un cinema autre (Manifesto for a Radical Femininity, for Another Cinema), and in 1978 they created the Cinema Corporel (Cinema of the Body). Using ambivalent mythological figures – their works feature Astarte (Ishtar), Electra, Persephone, hermaphrodites and angels – they developed their own symbolism and iconography, and they built up their status in French experimental cinema early on. As early as 1980, the cinema in the Centre Georges Pompidou organised the first retrospective of their films. In 2006 a monograph of their work was published and in 2016 Jeu de Paume, Paris, staged a retrospective of their works. MM

artists' website: www.klonaris-thomadaki.net

In the first part of the film Double Labyrinth, Katerina Thomadaki performs six actions, which are filmed by Maria Klonaris. In the second part they change
roles, and Klonaris performs while Thomadaki films. Seeing and being seen is thus doubled. The interaction of the artists with organic and inorganic objects loaded with symbolism demonstrates the interchangeability of social, individual and artistic roles. Both women search for themselves in the performance as they develop their own pictorial language through the camera, each in the presence of the other.

Courtesy Klonaris / Thomadaki

Format
super-8, colour, no sound, 55:00 min

Issue date
1975–1976