The Blue Nights series presents screenings of short art films by contemporary artists and cinematographers in the outside spaces of Minos Beach art hotel.
Cinema arrived in Greece, as elsewhere in Europe, in 1896. In the summer of 1900, summer screenings were introduced, hosted at various coffee shops on Syntagma Square in Athens. This was only the beginning of open-air cinema in Greece. The 1960s and 1970s were the golden era of open-air cimena, with more than 500 spaces in Athens only. The public still flocks to open-air cinemas today, making Greece perhaps the only place in the world where the institution is so widespread. In the mid-1970s, the first examples of video art were introduced to the Greek public, a new art form based on moving image and sound. Artists nowadays combine the cinematic image with the language of art, introducing new ideas and practices and enriching approaches to fine art more generally.
Inspired by this long and rich tradition, the Blue Nights series, inaugurated in the summer of 2019, utilises the outdoor spaces of Minos Beach art hotel to screen a curated selection of short art films by contemporary creators. Its first edition, curated by art historian Sotirios Bahtsetzis, presented the works of Alexandros Kaklamanos (Full Circle), James Lane (Oneiromantio or Hypno 29) and Theodoros Zafeiropoulos (Holy View).
Curated by: Sotiris Bahtsetzis
Location: Minos Beach art hotel, Agios Nikolaos, Crete
Duration: 13.07 – 04.11 2019
Participating Artists: Alexandros Kaklamanos, James Lane, Theodoros Zafeiropoulos
