Sessions

13/01/2025

Another edition of Sessions, 8 Sessions: XMAS EVE 2 NYE 2024 at Pythonos 8, came to a close, reminding us how fleeting and precious these moments are. We celebrate disappearance as much as appearance, embracing the now and the collective energy we create together in this ever-evolving performance.

This time, a smaller, cabaret-style intimacy brought us into new terrain. The closeness was a shock at first, as de-growth can be painful. Yet, it sparked something powerful: every movement, sound, and presence contributed to a visibly shared practice of creativity and solidarity.

Our deepest thanks to everyone who made this magic possible: those who came with open hearts, the team at the entrance and bar, and the 45+ artists who graces us with audacious performances, evocative talks, films, facilitated gatherings, offered euphoric music, and transformative magic.

Sessions remains a sanctuary for q***r creativity, experimentation, and community. Looking ahead, we hope to return soon with fresh ideas and provocations. In the evolving landscape of Nicosia, Cyprus—a city that is at once becoming a hostile space and a haven for new nests of resistance—we hope to continue contributing what we can: spaces where bodies can move, sweat, play, and dance, celebrating q***rness, defiance, and collective possibility. Together, we’ll keep transforming the stage, the dance floor, and each other, reclaiming joy and resistance as vital acts in a world that needs them.

🩷✨🩷

.ak and band ***rcollectivecy .stav .ypno .contradiction etc etc ✨🩷

29/01/2024

Μπορείτε να θκιαβάσετε εδώ το εξαιρετικό κείμενο του Πήτερ Εραμιάν, που είναι και η εισαγωγή στο βιβλίο μας, μεταφρασμένο στα ελληνικά από τη Δέσποινα Πυρκεττή.

Ευχαριστούμε Parathyro για την αναδημοσίευση.

"Το σημαντικότερο από όλα [..] είναι ότι έχουμε το ένα το άλλο."
Peter Eramian forever

«Είναι φορές που ορισμένα γεγονότα προκαλούν τόσο βαθιά συνειδησιακή μετατόπιση, ώστε να οριοθετούν ένα «πριν» και ένα «μετά», μια χρονική ρήξη με τις παραμέτρους ...

26/01/2024

A BOOK OF Q***R HAPPENINGS
Acknowledging the limited access we have to our q***r history, locally and beyond, it was important for us to compile this book right after our closing, in the spirit of making hay while the sun shines. With this book we are attempting to capture the rhythm, volume, and content of all that happened, with each page dedicated to each day between June and December 2023. We, Dimitris Chimonas & Lex Gregoriou, along with Clio Hadjigeorgiou, Demetris Shammas, Nicola Mitropoulou, and Loizos Olympios, assembled together images, texts, and archival material, to narrate Sessions’ takeover of the State Gallery of Contemporary Art - SPEL, to let this extraordinary moment be a reference to the future.

Special thanks to Peter Eramian for the panoptic introduction, Marilena Zakheos, Elena Vasiliou, Marina Ashioti, and Stavros S. Karyanni for the texts, reflections and notes, agia akira, Panayiotis Michael & Christina Lambrou, Pashies LTD, Ioulita Toumazi & Miriam Gatt, and Gervaise for writing for our monthly prints, now included in the book. We also extend our gratitude to everyone who enriched this q***r archive with photographs and texts.
We will forever be grateful to have collaborated with and witnessed together this multiplicity of q***r quests in this particular moment in Cyprus.

First edition of 100 copies will be available for 25EUR on Saturday, January 27th, at SPEL.

You can dm us for deliveries outside Cyprus (shipping costs not included)

25/01/2024

Τα Sessions ανοίγουν για τελευταία φορά τις πόρτες της Κρατικής Πινακοθήκης Σύγχρονης Τέχνης – ΣΠΕΛ το Σάββατο 27 Ιανουαρίου, στις 12:00 -20:00. Για το κλείσιμο των δράσεων θ....

05/01/2024

Contribute to Sessions’ archive!

From dance and theatre performances to Q***r Wave to concerts, book readings, screenings, workshops and parties, it's simpler to tell what Sessions does rather than what Sessions is. To document Sessions x SPEL as a happening, we are crafting a chronological assemblage of documents from all sessions in the form of a book, including images, texts, reflections, notes, and performance artifacts, including everything from the backstage to the center stage.

In order to do this, we are collecting material, and we invite you to contribute to this archive.

Submit your photos & videos
1. Click on the link in bio and choose Upload my Photos.
2. Create a folder with your name on the Google Drive folder.
3. Upload your photos.

You can send us any text, a reflection, a comment, a story to our email [email protected] (5 x ”s”). There is no limit to what you can write.

Deadline: Wednesday, January 10th 2024

The material submitted may or may not be published in the book or in other form by the team of Sessions, with the credit of the creator.

Thank you!

*photo of the traces of the performance THIRAMA by Alexis Vassiliou, Dec 9th, 2023

04/01/2024

What an epic ending to a surreal journey. Thank you all for making the closing so incredibly special. Thank you for participating in the past six months of Sessions at the State Gallery of Contemporary Art - SPEL, experimenting, sharing, learning, and witnessing with us. May these experiences fuel our hopes and actions for many days to come.
So long ❤️‍🔥

Disconnection Sucks
Incredible music by


Joralsky

Performances by
Gigile.chevalier
& .linda

Curated by

27/12/2023

THURSDAY, 28.12, 22:30, Late Session #6
“Waters of Cyprus, Syria, and Egypt” by Stavros S. Karayanni

Dance embodies not only what seems obvious and apparent but what flows surreptitiously in the fissures that open as ideology erodes emotion. The movement that intrigues me is fuelled by this flow and seeks to gesture towards that which is proscribed.  Censure collects in the body and transforms into sediments that are very often emotional: forbidden desires, wanting to love where you are taught to hate, resistance to normalization, the trauma of improper longings.  Movement is also directly connected to Memory and movement (and choreography) may function as story telling – a narrative of the body’s remembered but also unconscious history, a fluid and kinaesthetic record of the body.   While investigating Body and Memory this presentation poses questions that have to do with how we understand Memory in terms of ideology and in terms of the body; how we are able to dance our body’s narrative, and how we can attain an embodiment of desire as both a life-affirming force and a sorrowful loss.  And always the movement, carrying a body that is lightened by the exuberance of self discovery and heavied by the promise of deliverance just as the Memory springs forth like an oracle from the future to prophesy the past.

Stavros Karayanni publishes on culture, gender, and sexuality in the Middle East. His book Dancing Fear and Desire: Race, Sexuality and Imperial Politics in Middle Eastern Dance (Wilfrid Laurier UP 2004, reprinted 2005, 2007, 2010) reveals the intricate ways in which the present tradition of this controversial dance has been shaped by Eurocentric models that define and control identity performance. He teaches English Literature and Cultural Theory at European University Cyprus.

The performance will be the last Late Session presented after the last Cloud Transmission hosted by Ayios Loizos, on December 28th, at 22:30. The Late Sessions serve as a platform to facilitate the realisation of spontaneous  ideas and/or ideas that are best presented as surprises.

22/12/2023

As Sessions x SPEL draws to a close, we invite you to be part of a lasting record capturing the who, the how, and the what of what we experienced over the past six months. 

Photo-Me is a collaborative group founded by Haris Pellapaisiotis and Ioanna Economidou, with Anna Thomaidou, Claudia Paschalides, Angie Vein, and Ilia Pellapaisiotou. Photo-Me serves as a portable photographic studio booth, and the objective is to create archival photographic portraits of Sessions attendees, offering anyone interested the chance to present themselves as they wish before the camera.

The studio operates on the third floor of the State Gallery of Contemporary Art - SPEL, during all remaining events of Sessions x SPEL, and participation is free of charge. Attendees desiring their photographs can send a request to PHOTO ME on facebook.

Come as you are, as you were
As you want to be,
As a friend, as a friend

Take your time, hurry up
Choice is yours, don't be late
Bring a friend, 
Take a pose, or just stand. 

Come all dressed up, all dressed up,
as you are, 
As they don't want you to be,
As you want you to be. 

Memoria, Memoria, Memoria, Memoria.

*All photographic sessions are conducted in collaboration with the participant and require their approval. The captured images will contribute to the greater archive of Sessions as an artistic project, and might be published in the future by Photo-Me in the form of an exhibition or a publication. Neither Sessions nor Photo-Me will use any photographs for other purposes without written permission from the participant(s).

19/12/2023

Half of our pre-sale tickets have already been claimed! We appreciate your enthusiastic response. Thank you!

In our effort to maintain Sessions a safer and welcoming space, we are limiting and pre-selling tickets for the Xmas Eve and New Year's Eve events exclusively at SPEL. This ensures that they are initially made available within our extensive community network. We also prefer not to burden someone with the task of handling ticket sales on these special nights, and since the NYE party marks our final event, we would appreciate spending it with dedicated sessionistas!

Help us in making these gatherings memorable, ensuring that we all safely immerse ourselves in the night and celebrate the conclusion of the past six months in each other's loving company, by purchasing your tickets early ✨ 

24.12, 20:30, Sessionmas Eve with A Man to Pet, €5
31.12, 00:00, CLOSING: DISCONNECTION SUCKS, €10

Available at the State Gallery of Contemporary Art - SPEL, Tues-Sat 12:00-22:00

18/12/2023

FRI 29.12 16:00-00:00 Last Session: Pista Caca-Dada-Booboo

As Sessions x SPEL comes to a closure, we invite you to join us for one last jam at Pista Cacophonias. From 16:00 until midnight, we invite you to ride the waves of improvisation together with us and invited musicians, allowing for all that there is to be expressed to find its place. Videos and instagram stories will be collected on the spot, and edited live by Aggelos Charalambous. The 8-hour long sound recording and the video montage created by all of us on the day, will mark Sessions’ second collectively made movie.

No experience or preparation is needed.

Free participation.