The first Art Symposium was held in June 1988 in Agios Nikolaos, Crete. Thirty-two artists and five speakers, Greek and international, gathered at the Minos Beach art hotel. They conversed and created, in this public arena, in an exclusive landscape where the elements intertwined, where sand, rock, water and wind came together to trigger the imagination and the senses in every possible direction, laying the foundations for what is today the Sculpture Park.
These surroundings inspired the creation of works characterised by the variety and plurality of the artists’ aesthetic approaches. With different interests, orbits and leanings, from different cultural and educational backgrounds and belonging to different generations of the 20th century, the thirty two artists, through their synergy and partnership, realised an extremely indicative-revealing range of the artistic forces of the time.
The works produced, whether geometric, expressionist or naturalistic, freestanding, hanging, leaning or mounted on walls, are still vital parts of the natural environment of the hotel.
«The thirty two important artists […] stress and interpret what has been one of the principal features of art in the last quarter century: its multiplicity of forms and its pluralism of the feeling that art is not always to be experienced and analysed with chronological distance as a tool, but that the directness of its taste and its specific and determined impression should be the criterion.»
Dr. Dora Iliopoulou – Rogan (from the exhibition catalogue)
Conceived and organised by: Gina Mamidakis
Curated by: Vicky Dracos
Assisted by: Dmitri L. Coromilas
Photography: Chris Keeley
Text editing: Rinio Papatsaroucha – Missiou
Location: Minos Beach Hotel, Agios Nikolaos, Crete
Duration: 11.06 – 15.10 1988
Participating Artists: Opy Zouni, Yiannes (Iordanides), Vu Yannick, Paul Waldman, Costas Varotsos, Christos Tzivelos, Costas Tsoclis, Philip Tsiaras, Thanassis Totsikas, Theodoros, Anita Thacher, Katia Roka, Patrick Raynaud, Anne & Patrick Poirier, Nausica Pastra, Dennis Oppenheim, Eleni Mylonas, Eliseo Mattiacci, Joseph Kosuth, Marina Karella, Michael Kapsalis, Anish Kapoor, Ben Jacober, Mark Hadjipateras, Cris Gianakos, Vincent Gallo, Nassos Daphins, Carlo Ciarli, Sandro Chia, Vlassis Caniaris, Daniel Buren & Lynda Benglis
