ODC Ensemble
A Θeatre in Times of Crisis
Nefeli Editions | 2018
Destiny | 2004
Happiness Unlimited | 2016
Streams of Voices | 2003
Elli Papakonstantinou
Performance Director, Activist
A Night of Secrets | 2007
The Sound of the Gun | 2008
The Mysterious Mr Love | 2005
Tree of Happiness | 2017
Faith | 2006
They’re Playing our Song | 2005
Louisette: The Backstage of Revolution | 2017
Viciousness in the Kitchen | 2010
The Cave | 2018
Każin Barokk | 2018
Nine Lives, Ten Tails | 1997
Revolt Athenς | 2015
Debtocrazy Revolutions | 2015
The Suppliants after Aeschylus after Kossovo | 1999
Richard II | 2014
Ajax | 1998
Out Cry | 2016
Out Cry | 2011
Sous l’oiel d’Oedipe | 2010
Skin [Δέρμα] | 2012
Woyzeck Quartet | 2012
From Α to Ω | 2010
The Country | 2009
The Iron | 2004
ODC …After Homer | 2002-04
ODC, after Homer’s Odyssey | 2009
Ma Vie de Chandelles | 2012
Touching the Bottom of the Sea | 2013
Oedipus: Sex with Mum was Blinding | Upcoming
Femme et Loup | 2014
The Decameron of Women | 2000
The Ships | 2005
Mετά [After] | 2011
Lettre aux Jeunes Acteurs | 2008
Vyrsodepseio
Art Space | Athens
A Winter’s Tale | 2021
A key element in ODC’s work is their multi-disciplinary practice, which I see as an expression of the idea of multiplicity from which emerges ODC’s politics of desire, not only as a narrative device (that too), but merely as an aesthetic and ethical proposition. The political, in this sense, is not merely related to what ODC’s work means, but what it does.
– Philip Hager
© Alex Kat Photography
Founded in 2002, ODC Ensemble has made more than 20 works for theatre, dance, film and media directed by Elli Papakonstantinou. ODC Ensemble founding members are: Dimitris Kamarotos, Elli Papakonstantinou, Tilemachos Mousas, Telis Karananos & Alexandra Siafkou, Andrian Frieling and Valia Papachristou. Further members include: Anastasia Katsinavaki, Pantelis Makkas, Rosa Prodromou, Aglaia Pappa, Alex Kat, Olympia Mytilinaiou and Stella Rapti.
ODC Ensemble was based at their own venue cultural space Vyrsopdeseio from 2011 until 2017.
The Group’s work include: ODC After Homer (2002), Viciousness in the Kitchen (2010), Μετά/After (2011), Woyzeck Quartet (2012), Skin (2012), Richard II (2014), Revolt Athens (2015), Luisette: the Backstage of Revolution (2017), Τhe Cave (2018), Każin Barokk (2018), all directed by Elli Papakonstantinou.
Among recent artistic achievements, the company has been nominated winner of the Music Theater Now 2018 International competition and also the First Award Prize at the BE Festival for the REP, Birmingham, UK and has been supported by The Greek Ministry of Culture, the Arts Council of Great Britain, Denmark and Sweden.
The Guardian | The Guide | 15.08.2002
BBC Worldwide
Panayotis Kouparanis | Deutsche Welle | 13.11.2015
A work that redefines the meaning of contemporary musical theatre with social meaning away from any realistic reference to prosaic complaints. A substantial aesthetic event…
Dimitris Tsatsoulis
greek-theatre.gr | 13.10.2018
A veritable bombardment of all senses. Eye, ear and not least brain fought to keep up… strange and beautiful, ugly and cruel…
Bent Stenbakken
nordjyske.dk | 11.08.2018
BE Festival, Birmingham REP | 07.07.2018
Iliana Dimadi
athinorama.gr | 16.06.2018
Yorgos Pefanis
CNN Ggreece | 25.06.2016
The Greek ODC Ensemble is a solid, courageous and multi-faceted ensemble.
Se Mere | sceneblog.dk | 08.08.2018
they
wrote about
The Theatre of Consciousness
[extract of the book Vyrsodepseio: a Θeatre in Times of Crisis]
[…] Already in its first foray into the Greek theatre world, ODC decided almost unconsciously to set up its headquarters at this very spot: the agora. As a theatrical movement with a distinctly political flavour, the Ensemble wanted, first and foremost, to be part of the city and occupy a central place in its consciousness.
[…] Let us take a look at the past: we can trace ODC’s distant ancestors to the stage experiments of Malina and Beck’s Living Theatre, the 1960s and 1970s conceptualisations of theatre as a political act; a space where artists can communicate among themselves, where artists and audiences can interact with the city.
[…] The buzz of a journey that is both ancient and timeless, a journey about individual and political self-awareness can be heard by the young people who are active players in this city, by Elli Papakonstantinou and her Ensemble, by artists and audiences. The vessel making this voyage will, once again, bear the initials ‘ODC’.
Grigoris Ioannidis | pp.55-56
ODC and the Politics of Desire
[extract of the book Vyrsodepseio: a Θeatre in Times of Crisis]
[…] A key element in ODC’s work is their multi-disciplinary practice, which I see as an expression of the idea of multiplicity; a multiplicity from which emerges ODC’s politics of desire, not only as a narrative device (that too), but merely as an aesthetic and ethical proposition. The political, in this sense, is not merely related to what ODC’s work means, but what it does.
[…] In this sense, the performance devised by ODC produced an affective multiplicity, an assemblage that interacted with spectators and space not as a way into the ancient text, but as a way out of habitual conceptions and ideological uses of ancient Greek literary tradition.
Philip Hager | pp.68-71
Performances of Engagement and Disruption
[extract of the book Vyrsodepseio: a Θeatre in Times of Crisis]
[…] Upon watching ODC’s performances we get a sense of intense loneliness, as well as the gruelling endeavour to create something new.
Filimon Patsakis | p.103
Lived Aesthetics of Crisis and Performance Politics of Discontent
[extract of the book Vyrsodepseio: a Θeatre in Times of Crisis]
[…] ODC’s performative energies and live art strategies go beyond the representation or anticipated avant-garde theatricality. Capitalising on lived experiences and socio-political awareness, ODC’s work bursts with the power of live art, urging us to revolt by way of questioning our empirical reality and critically engaging with it.
Maria Konomi | p.180
FAITH
[extract of the book Vyrsodepseio: a Θeatre in Times of Crisis]
[…] Fortunately, ODC is as realist as it is romantic. If that was not the case, the Ensemble would have never gone on to tackle a project as extroverted and collectively demanding as Louisette 4, presented at the Old Oil Mill of Eleusis in the summer of 2017.
[…] ODC Ensemble […] through endless hours of group work in the hopes of creating a lively hot-spot, a meeting point for art and activism […] was fully aware that […] the? / The space had to serve as a bridge between the past and the present, promoting the concept of continuity and highlighting the individual as an active agent.
[…] The shift from a theatre of convention (which by no means should be identified with conventional theatre) to a live spectacle, free of traditional conventions (which can, in turn, also become deadly, that is, conventional and dull, according to Brook) can be realised only if invested with a vital meaning. […] The idea was to reject formulaic and formalist art in favour of art that is substantial, grounded to reality, poignant and moving. That was my first time at Vyrsodepseio.
Dimitra Kondylaki | p36, 42 and 48
Greek Theatre in the Age of Depression (Greece)
As Elli Papakonstantinou, director of the avant-garde multi-ethnic performance group ODC, claims, “[our] ensemble is a politically oriented group. As practitioners and as citizens of a country that stands as a worldwide ‘showcase’ for politicians and bankers and for the ongoing struggle to preserve democracy, we are motivated by an urge to reinvent the role of Art. For us, Art must now stand in the front line of opposition and questioning.
ODC ensemble creates engaged art, out of the box, in unexpected spaces and with the participation of volunteers who have no previous art experience. Our aim is to provoke, question and in times of national shock, break taboos and theatrical conventions”. An observation that recalls Walter Benjamin’s description of the Dadaists’ art as an “instrument of ballistics that hits the spectators like a bullet” (Benjamin 1968: 197), removing them beyond their realm of understanding to a new way of perceiving actions and events.
ODC’s deconstructive work on the end of grand narratives engages fiercely with the postmodern dramatic idiom and local forms of popular entertainment and political rhetoric. A good example of that is META, the group’s recent site- specific performance put on in an abandoned tannery in Botanicos (Vyrsodepsio, 2010), with the help of experienced actors and activists. As the director makes the point in ODC’s electronic page, “META is not just a performance; [but] a public discussion on WHAT COMES AFTER (META)?”; a work on the meaning of the end (TELOS) of narratives and the relation of people to society in a moment of crisis”.
This same idea of loss is also central in their next site-specific project, Derma (Skin, 2012), a “tribute to mechanical work, monotony, mourning and apathy,” as the director claims. By incorporating dance, music and visual arts, both performances dramatize what is going on now in Greece and the world in general and at the same time bridge the gap between the real and the theatrical, the professional actor and the amateur, the realistic and the bizarre. It is the ensemble’s answer to the question of the country’s two major national theatres, “What is a homeland?”: a series of estrangements.
Savvas Patsalidis | Critical Stages: The IATC webjournal | June 2013, Issue No.8
International network for contemporary performing arts, is a network of over 500 performing arts organisations and individual members working in the contemporary performing arts worldwide: theatre, dance, circus, interdisciplinary live art forms, new media.
Trans Europe Halles (TEH) is a Europe-based network of cultural centres initiated by citizens and artists. TEH has been at the forefront of re-purposing Europe’s industrial buildings for arts, culture and activism since 1983. As of 2018, TEH has brought together 109 multidisciplinary cultural centres and other cultural organisations from across Europe.
Polart Circle initiates a partner’s platform at the European scale, associating art companies, scholars, universities, civil society organisations and youth integration organisations. Activities gathers artist-educators, emerging artists, experts and citizens interested in the relationship between art and politics.
Creative Lenses is a four-year (2015-2019) project that seeks to make arts and cultural organisations more resilient and sustainable by improving their business models and developing their long-term strategic and innovation capacities.
Global Grand Central (former Europe Grand Central), is a ground-breaking cooperation effort that combines grass-roots projects by independent culture organizations across Europe and beyond through a unique digital and conceptual platform to connect audience-created narratives about the human act of crossing borders.
Elli is a stage director, writer, visual artist and cultural manager. Founder of ODC Ensemble performing company and of the art space Vyrsodepseio in Athens.
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ODC Ensemble
A Θeatre in Times of Crisis
Nefeli Editions | 2018
Destiny | 2004
Happiness Unlimited | 2016
Streams of Voices | 2003
Elli Papakonstantinou
Performance Director, Activist
A Night of Secrets | 2007
The Sound of the Gun | 2008
The Mysterious Mr Love | 2005
Tree of Happiness | 2017
Faith | 2006
They’re Playing our Song | 2005
Louisette: The Backstage of Revolution | 2017
Viciousness in the Kitchen | 2010
The Cave | 2018
Każin Barokk | 2018
Nine Lives, Ten Tails | 1997
Revolt Athenς | 2015
Debtocrazy Revolutions | 2015
The Suppliants after Aeschylus after Kossovo | 1999
Richard II | 2014
Ajax | 1998
Out Cry | 2016
Out Cry | 2011
Sous l’oiel d’Oedipe | 2010
Skin [Δέρμα] | 2012
Woyzeck Quartet | 2012
From Α to Ω | 2010
The Country | 2009
The Iron | 2004
ODC …After Homer | 2002-04
ODC, after Homer’s Odyssey | 2009
Ma Vie de Chandelles | 2012
Touching the Bottom of the Sea | 2013
Oedipus: Sex with Mum was Blinding | Upcoming
Femme et Loup | 2014
The Decameron of Women | 2000
The Ships | 2005
Mετά [After] | 2011
Lettre aux Jeunes Acteurs | 2008
Vyrsodepseio
Art Space | Athens
A Winter’s Tale | 2021
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