I first came to know the poetry of Nikos Alexis Aslanoglou during my student years, when together with my good friend Nikos, bored of overanalyzing the “classic” modern greek poets – Kavafis, Elytis, Seferis, we spent a lot of our evenings looking for undergorund, hidden poetic gems.
The years passed, and Aslanoglou’s poetry had remained in my memory as an abstract, melancholic image. Until, sometime during the past summer, while organising my thoughts for still life with improvisation, I took his book “odes to the prince” from the library and began re-reading it obsessively. The first fruit of this renewed relationship with the poet was “for them“, a piece that was created and recorded almost instantly, as if it had been in my mind for years.
The second fruit was the presentation of five poems from the book in the soundacts festival in Athens. A unique experience, in which my on-stage loneliness, despite how nervous it made me feel, also brought me closer to the poet’s own loneliness. So, I decided that my relationship with “odes to the prince” was not meant to end there.
In June 21, in Chania, in the underground turkish well in Splantzia square, I will present the third fruit, the next stage of this work in progress. With more poems, more soundcrafting experimentations, and amazing video works by Danae Syrrou.
Can’t wait.