“Hotel Aphrodite” is a diptych project consisting of a small site-specific installation at the entrance to the Monastery of the Heart in Tinos. The installation is the work of Zisis Kotionis and hosts a sound work by Phoebe Giannisi. The installation construction is titled “The Bedroom” and the sound work is titled “Invocations”.
The project is inspired by the architectural typology of the traditional Dovecotes of Tinos, where pigeons and humans lived together in a single cycle of mutual feeding of their metabolism. Since in ancient times pigeons were birds of Aphrodite, the structure of the Peristerion can be understood as a kind of hosting space for the absent goddess. Με τους όρους της ανθρωποκαίνου, ο Περιστεριώνας είναι μια υποδειγματική κατασκευή συμβίωσης ανθρώπων και ζώων ή αλλιώς ζωανθρώπων (humanimals).
The material part of the project, which is the installation “Bedroom”, consists of two IKEA bedside tables for humans and pigeons, which are placed on the two pillars of the entrance to the Monastery of the Heart. The transmitter of the audio part of the work is included in the construction and transmits the “Invocations”. The two bedside tables on either side of the entrance contain and offer food and water to passing birds. Thus, the invocations to the goddess are simultaneously invocations to the birds to come and be hosted in the open installation. As the birds arrive, the entire space of the small monastery becomes a large dovecote and the “Aphrodite Hotel” becomes a metonym for the “Monastery of the Heart”.
Diptych work by Phoebe Giannisi and Zisis Kotionis, for the art exhibition “Persephone’s Nightmare”, curated by Christoforos Marinos and Christos Chrysopoulos.
Construction time: June 2023
Materials: Iron, particleboard, Karystos slabs, bird food, water
Dimensions: 40X40X70 centimeters (two items)