Despina Charitonidi’s practice unfolds between construction and collapse, drawing from the tactile memory of urban Athens and the layered temporality of marine landscapes. Across sculpture, installation, and performance, raw materials—clay, iron, gold leaf—are reconfigured into environments that speak to balance, failure, transformation. The work filters lived experience through processes of layering and experimentation, where the body often becomes both builder and witness, and where form resists finality. Gesture, weight, and resistance remain central to a practice shaped by rupture and ritual.

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How has your upbringing or cultural heritage shaped the themes and techniques you explore in your art today?  

I grew up in the city of Athens, a chaotic, anarchic, very versatile place full of contrasts. I have spent all my summers by the sea, it’s very easy to access the sea from all over the city and impossible not to during the warmer months. I come from a family of builders, so in my artistic language I often use construction materials, which shows a familiarity towards this environment. My work leans towards a tendency to strip down natural and primary elements found in urban and underwater construction sites, where I focus on reforming and transmuting these elements through a process of rigorous experimentation with their properties. The results unveil a number of sculptural gestures that aim to underline the complexities and nuances of man’s perpetual interference with the environment. In my work, I often use clay. I love the element of surprise, and clay is one material that offers it, as there are many stages as far as its elaboration is concerned. The stage where it is raw, has a certain colour, then my favourite, the time of glazing inside the kiln. I consider fire a stable collaborator. Clay transforms from pliable mud to durable brick through drying and firing, reflecting our inclination to harness natural resources for construction, a testament to our ingenuity and symbiotic relationship with the environment, as it is also one of the first materials ever used for creating from the cave era. Sometimes I think of an older work of mine, a performance called “Sijmen says”. It is a simple act where the performer is building a pedestal for herself while trying to balance on it. Every time a brick is added, the pedestal increases in height and the person struggles to reach the next brick. Like any tendency to conquer every square meter, material or immaterial substance, we expand ourselves on it, we reach the level of sweat and concentration in an operation characterised by an accurate process, as in a daring but ineluctable ritual of growth. Step by step, the bricks are structured, forming a sort of "pedestal" under the performer’s whole body. Making an effort, building, laying the foundations and climbing, with the aim of remaining in balance, with only one thing that is certain, that at the end, there will be the fall. Indeed, the pedestal takes shape and the legs and arms are engaged in an effort that always seems too much to bear.  With the dedication to climb to the highest point, fearless, exploring ever different and effective positions to complete the task, the “builder” proves their awareness & maturity, in a difficult and impervious act of performance. When I present this work, I don't give up, even when the fall is inevitable; everything at some point collapses in a ruinous way.  It is precisely the fall that frees the nonsense of everything, dissolving this metaphor of man from his efforts and his chains.

Is art created for the artist, the audience, or somewhere in between?  

I believe art is fundamentally created to express the internal aspects of life. Maybe it is a reaction to something you hear or see and you feel like you need to add your view on it. What I mean is that it could be a poem you envision, an older painting you reinterpret, a certain state of mind you live in at that particular moment; that, for some reason had a large impact on you, and expressing yourself artistically over that particular subject is the best way of externalizing your thoughts or emotions.

So I believe that as a primal intention – art is created by and for the creator. I have a paradoxical way of explaining this when I want to make a short but to-the-point explanation; for me, creating is like you need to sneeze. It is a need coming from within, an uncontrollable need that needs to be released, that when you don’t, it’s always annoying and you feel incomplete. But when you do, even if for a moment you feel the pressure of a minor heart attack, in the end you experience a completion, a calmness. This is the part where art is for and by the creator. Nevertheless, I am convinced that the moment you choose to share your artwork – in any context (gallery, artist-run space, online event, even a studio visit, etc.) the selfish line begins to blur. Personally, I call it the moment you unhide your work. It doesn’t matter if the artwork is finished or not because at that particular moment, it is not about reaching a certain level, sometimes we exhibit works in progress, in a way to understand them better… I think it is more about wanting to communicate something very specific in a specific moment. So this is why artistic creation begins as one of the most selfish emotions (by saying selfish I mean it is a totally personal need, and only the author can navigate through it), and then after diving inside oneself and filtering one's emotions and ideas, the final choices are made – it becomes the most altruistic move, a move that takes a lot of courage for a person to present their inner thoughts and get exposed. It is a mental nudity, an honest fragility in the moment where one stands in a space, saying here I am, these are my ideas, this is how I am executing them, I am ready to communicate it to others, ready to succeed or fail totally, ready to be accepted or rejected. And I think it needs a lot of courage for someone to get exposed and wait for all the positive or negative criticism. Because there is always a bit of both. To sum up, the line of “in between” for me starts at the moment where one decides to share their work with their audience. 

If you could step back into any artistic era, which would it be and why? 

I hope not to over-romanticize it, but often I wish I could live in the first three quarters of the 21st-century era to begin with, but more specifically the Situationist International times. I love all this vibe of the Cobra artists, etc. I am fond of the painting and sculpture at that time, whereas I also admire the strategies of participatory, uneasy relationships with the public in the performance art field. I am intrigued by the historical avant-garde – of reapproaching life, translating the ordinary to the absolute extraordinary. Also, I find the artistic approach during these years incredibly contemporary aesthetically, as also the sociopolitical scene. I believe artists react to their social surroundings, and I find the Situationist International a very playful and honest approach of art within life. I think in some ways they were not even “trapped” in the art itself. I find their questions; what is an art object? what is art? why is it interesting? to the point until today. I think they had an incredibly bold and honest approach, and I wish I could learn many things being exposed to that. I mean, if we think of Guy Debord’s question of “It is not about whether something interests you, rather than if you yourself can become more interesting under new conditions of cultural creation,” I think the focus, or the activation of the audience, is extremely interesting and challenging at the same time! Because it challenges the boundaries of what we expect art to do, to be... Also, I have a soft spot for Society of the Spectacle. I mean, when you read the phrase “All that was once directly lived has become mere representation. Images from every aspect of life merge into a common stream and the former unity of life is lost forever,” one can imagine how breathtaking it is to be able to apply it to contemporary society of phantasmagoria, where we all find ourselves running around in circles. I think the spectacle in this sense sometimes is just image, data, impressions, and for me it’s a Matrix-like situation. So yes, I think I would like to live in the era where these questions were authentically born, elaborated, and analyzed by artists, philosophers, poets, etc. I would learn a lot by living in an intense environment, intellectually challenging and creatively radical, surrounded by avant-garde thinkers. I believe that the concept of art as revolution is something very intriguing for me. Coming from Athens, a city that has a deep underground scene, I can relate with the concept of reclaiming space, reclaiming the city, for the society that experiences it, for the human experience above all. The city as a playground where we can learn and provoke each other. And I think during the Situationist International, what fascinates me most is that it seems that a certain kind of reaction or revolution, or resistance, is not just political, rather strongly cultural and existential. I believe that making art is inherently a political act. It represents a stance toward total freedom—especially in a society where true freedom is so difficult to attain. Art allows you to create your own rules, to express yourself without constraint. In that sense, it embodies a deeply anarchic spirit: a refusal to conform, a reclamation of autonomy, and a challenge to imposed structures.

How has your artistic style transformed over the years?  Are there specific influences, experiments, or moments that marked a turning point? 

I am a very curious person; I think sometimes it even confuses me – or scares me – my thirst for the “new”… I see my practice as a never-ending experiment. I have always used symbolism within my sculptural language. Growing up in a family of builders gave me a strong familiarity with various building materials and a great sensitivity towards the city’s urban landscape. At the same time, living by the sea, marine objects often occupy a central position in my work, reflecting natural, historical, and economic aspects. The nature of my artwork is defined by its original idea, where I find its exact adaptable form – be it a monumental installation or an ephemeral performance. I build environments on a material-based approach wherein all components maintain a conceptual and symbolic relationship. In performances, though, the core idea begins with the human act. Since physical communication almost effortlessly provides a direct understanding, the performance field results as the ideal way for my ideas to come across. Most of my live or video works treat the body as a tool of limited capabilities, uncontrolled fragility, and mimic repetition. Through the years, I have been combining my installations and I (almost) always activate my sculptures through performances, as I consider the human agent a sculpture with a heartbeat. I think a key moment during my time as a student was when I transferred my studies to the Netherlands. There, I was introduced and encouraged to perform. In my mind, the field of performance art was closer to theatre or dance, but now I see it just as sculptures in motion. When I started presenting my work in a more open direction and positioned myself in it – literally body and mind – it was a shifting point for my practice. I started thinking in more directions, not just straight lines. I like to treat my works as ensembles that are part of an orchestra and need their maestro to be revived, may that be the viewer or the artist.

Since my work feeds from experimentation, either in ways of expressing an idea or mediums that represent it, there has been a chapter in my ceramic works that I have been focusing on for the past five years. I have been making these clay canvases, which I call the “Imaginary Cartography” series, which are perceived as a tango between argill and fire. A climate simulation, a small chamber of time acceleration where ice age and heat wave are engraved on the surface of the clay (the clay represents a piece of land here). The kiln is perceived as a beast, a furnace of fire and fury, where earth and stone dance in chaos, each particle trembling in the heat. Crystals, hidden in the glaze composition, wait for their moment of birth, as flames scorch and winds swirl, violent, relentless, fierce. Hours stretch, the heat peaks, and the magma material melts into liquid glass. In this crucible of destruction, geometry and harmony begin their quiet rise. From violence blooms serenity, as crystals form in molten streams, growing like planetary gas forms in the fire, capturing the human tendency to create nature again. The process ends, the fury cools, and what remains is still, sublime, a fragile world of absolute beauty, born from chaos, shaped by time. Like taking a picture of an instant of the geological time that forms us all.

And this is just one chapter of my work. To make these pieces I don’t use colorants or chemical powders, but pure resources such as cobalt, iron, lithium, or even lead. I find huge symbolism in the properties of the materials I use. For example, gold leafs, or iron, or clay – they all play a different role as they all have different properties. What I mean is that iron, for example, is a material we use on construction sites. Reinforced concrete has iron rods inside, yet iron comes from stellar fusions. It is a cosmic dust, a gas cloud formed from heavenly bodies, and to elaborate more, we get iron inside our bodies (from consuming food like plants or meat) to help us get oxygen in our blood. So there I see many symbolic connections that, when put together, can tell an interesting story about our relationship with the natural resources off and on our planet, and these are the experiments I am diving into more – the ones that lead me into many different directions, in unexpected ways, and force me to grow and think bigger, more spherical.

Has there ever been a time when the creative process felt more like a burden than a joy? How did you navigate that? 

I think I am a person who gets heavily influenced by their environment. To be honest, after so many years, I have learnt to recognize it when it happens. When I leave my comfort zone, there is this specific period when creativity feels so much more like a burden than a joy, and it always happens in the same way, and it is always the same feelings I am experiencing. Now I have understood the pattern. I know the situation, and I know how to navigate through it. It is something I hadn’t realized the first few times I had travelled for work. When I move around for an exhibition, a residency, or when I have projects abroad, as a consequence I move my whole life around. I even bring my cat anywhere I am invited to stay, especially when it is for more than a month, I would say. So the first week or the first two weeks are the worst for me. I find it very hard to relax and decode my environment. I am very slow in that. I need to take a lot of walks and map my surroundings. So usually my creative process gets stuck. Or actually, this is the part of the creative process where everything seems more destructive. I feel very fragile and insecure because I am not in my usual space, I don’t have my tools, I don’t have the timetable I used to have, and in general, all the new parameters of a place—like the weather, the people, the language—shake me out of my everyday life. In the end, it is always for the best, and this is why I am doing it, and would like to continue doing it. But yet I recognize now that it is a bad period where I feel more depressed and not sure of myself. I defy my ideas, I get scared and feel lost, so I cannot really focus on my research. Maybe because all situations are scary at the beginning. In the end, I am very good at adapting myself to new situations, I really am – but I need to do so in my own time. And that shifting period of time is a very hard and lonely period where I feel very small and sometimes I panic, but in the end I make my nicest work, and I look back at these experiences with so much gratitude. As said though, I think I have now recognized this pattern. For example, from March until June I was in Italy at Cittadellarte, a beautiful residency in Biella, where I met the most amazing people and created one of my deepest and most sincere works that I could have imagined, and I was extremely happy with it. Nevertheless, I do remember my first weeks there – I was wondering all the time if it was the right choice to leave my everyday comfort and change everything for some months. New conditions, new experiences, new settings, new rules... sometimes it is a lot to take in... and your mind starts asking all these uncomfortable questions like: Why am I doing this? Why did I have the urgency to leave? What if this doesn’t go as planned? What if I fail to deliver? You know... all these thoughts are lurking like small panic attacks. But in the end, every day you wake up and you are more confident, and then it finally pays off. I think I even found a mechanism to fight this... I keep repeating that these are familiar feelings, and then I start walking around, a lot. I try to get familiar with the space, feel kinda local... When I get into a comfort zone, then I start working on my ideas and in the end, I create a new world that helps me cope in the new world I am in, at that specific period of my life.

Artificial Intelligence is increasingly infiltrating creative fields. Do you see artificial intelligence as a threat, a tool, or a collaborator in the art world? 

The Artificial Intelligence reality is quite a distant reality from mine… It is a field I haven’t dived into yet or felt any interest towards. There are fellow artists that I admire and know personally who do work with AI and make wonderful results, yet I don’t feel it is my language… I am not very good with computers; actually, I am kind of technophobic, and I believe in many scenarios of conspiracy, paranoia, and future massive destruction (which I don’t think is necessarily bad). Nevertheless, I just finished doing a residency and met an artist who uses AI as a consultant – and I must admit I found that weird, but on the other side, if it helps their practice, who am I to judge? With the same artist, I recently collaborated on an AI film (5 min), and that was an experiment which I was very happy with. So, from this small personal experience, I can tell you it did open a door for me. I see it more as a tool, and I am not worried about the authorship of the artwork (if it was the machine or us), but I did find some aesthetic choices problematic. When people use a specific platform, that platform offers certain features, colour palette, motions, etc., so the author must be very careful to be able to “make it theirs.”

If we all take a pen and draw a line, even if it is the same pen (colour, size), we will all have different lines in the end, and this is because we all have a different, personal (if you will) way of gesture. Graphics have very specific settings, so the chances of having similar end results with other artists using the same platforms are high. Nevertheless, I must say that I was very excited about the result, and it was an extremely interesting experience, but I did not feel the emotions I feel when I create a physical work. After all, the immaterial needs the material to exist… I am not worried a lot about the role of Artificial Intelligence in the art world because I think it is up to the creator to see how to use this “service.” There are limits in uses. For example, if someone has an idea and uses AI to realise it; the direction, aesthetics, and details of the concept are up to the creator, so the parameters of the “programming” can condition well the end result. The AI is a tool, and I think when the language of the artist is strong, then technology is a medium like clay, or marble, or even a choreographed body, so in that case I would say that someone can use AI as a collaborator. The threat part would be more visible when someone doesn’t have a strong idea of what they want to create, and they might use AI as a solution. But this is again good because an idea that is not strong will not survive anyway. On the other side of the story, if the Artificial Intelligence is creating better stuff than us, then maybe there is going to be a movement of non-human-created artworks – and I am quite curious to see where that will go. Where I am standing now, I find it quite hard to imagine being threatened by a machine, as I believe that a true piece of art comes from a deeper place, a less conscious state, a deeper dive into the soul and poetry of someone. I think that artworks have so many more layers than the ones we are seeing in the end results. What I mean is that for a work to be created – at least for me – it is so personal that I cannot imagine a technological threat. The only true threat would be for someone to lose their honesty and origin of thought, and I don’t think it is the AI that will threaten that state. If the foundations of an idea are not stable, then the idea itself (no matter the medium it is created with) is at risk.

Do you believe artists have a responsibility to address climate change or environmental concerns in their work? Why or why not?

Even though I work a lot around the subject of natural resources, I don’t think artists have a responsibility to address climate change or any environmental concerns in their work because I believe that it is not a goal, or a responsibility, an obligation, or a rule. I think of artists as people who observe and react to their life and surroundings, thus I find it impossible for us not to speak of climate change—not because we have to, but because it is inevitable. For example, a sculptor—if they use a material, let’s say metal—the artwork is not about climate change, but the connotation of the metal as material is there. There is so much information around us that I believe when we see an artwork, we examine how it is made, how much power it needs to work (if we are talking about a digital work), or where the materials come from (if it is a physical work). Nevertheless, I must say again that I don’t see the fact of addressing environmental concerns as a responsibility, but as an inevitability. I see artists as the visual poets of their time. So if we are in the era of Romanticism, then art is Romantic; if we are in the Modernist era, then the art is Modern. So I believe that any artist living in our time will speak in their own way about climate change—even if the subject is not apparent at all. The presence of climate change is either obvious or subtle, but I think it is always there. Personally, I prefer more subtle approaches, but this is only about taste. In 2023 I showed the work “No-body” at Theocharakis Foundation in Athens. The work consisted of two bodies, choreographed to play a childlike game where the gold leaf is supposed to weather afloat, controlled by breathing. The paradoxical, futile effort of keeping “something” high is meant to comment on the ephemeral existence of power and (financial) value. The repetitive blowing is wrinkling the gold leaf, tearing it into pieces. The result is the decay and perish of both the material and the human body. If we think of that work—it consists of a body and a material. Gold is supposed to be indestructible. Maybe someone would not think I am commenting on climate change and all the environmental concerns, but if we make a simple thought of: where does gold come from, or how can a single breath tear it to pieces?—then I think it is a lot about the environment and its resources, how we use them, and how much effort we are making to be able to control them.

In an increasingly globalized world, how can artists preserve authenticity and cultural integrity in their work? 

I believe it is hard to keep your authenticity in general in such a globalized world. Not only in the art world, but in many aspects of contemporary life; globalisation is deep inside our way of living, in our habits, our mindset is constructed under globalised realities, and it is very hard to keep a fortified character. So this challenge exists in the times we live in, in general, towards almost all directions. Let’s take the simplest example. Personally, I can tell you I never had Facebook, and I remember always using Skype to communicate with my friends as I studied abroad. I remember never getting invites for events, or updates on classes because I was not on the FB app. I don’t say this to blame the platforms – I am just pointing out how strongly life is structured around a system that whoever decides not to be part of it is probably excluded. In the art world, there are trends and tendencies, and we can clearly see a direction of where sculpture is going now, or painting trends that are more popular. Even performance art is circling itself, as it happens in all disciplines that are influenced by the same things… and it is quite often that one can recognise a certain approach or a style or a hype being spread fast, as there are a few important IG profiles or art platforms that show the most prominent artworks. I guess years ago a style/approach would spread slowly; consequently, people in that case would be able to elaborate more on it, study its theoretical context, and shape it so that one can give it a more personal outcome. And this is how movements would be created. A movement lasts for years; it has a manifesto, a strong statement based on aesthetic, philosophic, or political conditions. Nowadays our lives are so fast, and we have more trends (short-period tendencies) and not so many actual artistic movements. I think we recycle each other as we are fed by the same amount of offline and online frenetic information. Subconsciously, we repeat patterns. Nevertheless, I think there are ways to be able to keep a protected cultural integrity. I believe that when one is completely honest – and I am not saying it is easy – but if one can be profoundly sincere with their thoughts and emotions, if the research is literally the only thing that rules your thoughts during these fragile moments of creation, then honesty becomes innovation. The “authentic” is not something that hasn’t been done before – everything has been done before, there is no virginity in art, at least this is how I see it  but I believe in an approach personal to the bone, deep and honest, that introduces something new. Like a handwriting. It is hard to imitate one's handwriting, and it is always better to use your own trace, say the things you want to say in your own words, honestly, from the depths of your thoughts. This is when you preserve your authenticity – when you are truly honest towards yourself, then you are towards everyone.

Can art be truly therapeutic? Have you experienced its healing power personally, or seen it impact others?

As a sculptress, I do believe that art is therapeutic. I am definitely convinced, as I experience it personally in the moments I am creating something. I do not know if the artistic impact is that of healing in a broader sense, as of course it has never ceased any wars or prevented any large catastrophes—at least I haven’t seen such a large impact. Artworks activate a memory; they tell a story, yes, but I think it impacts more its creator rather than its audience. From my experience, artistic expression is pure freedom. Personally, I haven’t felt stronger and safer than in the moment of the conception and realisation of an artwork. I think artists are incredibly lucky (and I don’t mean visual artists only—in my head, any kind of creative expression is an act of art, a cook can be an artist, etc.) because they are translating exactly what they have in their imagination—from immaterial to material. So this is very liberating, thus truly healing—if you think about it, an artist can literally create new worlds, new rules, and live in them. I believe it is the safe area of the mind, the fortress of a restless soul. As far as the impact on others is concerned, I have seen several times—especially when I conduct workshops with children—that the impact is very strong. I think it is like a new door, an indication of a path that is not reinforced as much as it should be. It is quite often that children “unlock” when a creative way of thinking is introduced to them. I find this also very healing—being able to express yourself, your thoughts, in a playful framework but also within some rules. As a performer, I have noticed that there is a certain energy between the audience and the performers, when they are present in the work. Since physical communication almost effortlessly provides a direct understanding, the performance field results as the ideal way for people to identify with a situation and think of similar scenarios. I do consider the human agent a sculpture with a heartbeat. It is interesting because in ancient Greece, the art of performing—in the theatrical plays—had a very specific role, that of psychological support. The goal of the plays was to take possible real-life scenarios and simulate behaviours and reactions. From studies, it has emerged that ancient tragedy functioned as a systemic method of psychotherapy, on the basis of which healing was achieved at the individual, family, social, and political levels. More specifically, the therapeutic function of the chorus (the ensemble of voices) in ancient tragedy was primarily based on its close connection with the spectators and the universal participation of the latter in the tragic action. Also, it was shown that the balancing function of the chorus of ancient tragedy lies in the formation of an inseparable relationship between the Apollonian and the Dionysian element, which compose the opposite aspects of human existence—the lusts, pleasures, sins, and darker thoughts of humans. To sum up, I do find art therapeutic, and I think it is undoubtedly helpful for the person creating it. When one succeeds in keeping strong emotions captured in the work, then it is also therapeutic for the audience. When the author can communicate their ideas and the viewer manages to perceive them, this “click” unlocks the mind, and something slightly changes, and a new point of view is introduced. Then I think art can be therapeutic for all.

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