Michalis' works use videos as media basically and look for the relationship between the surrounding environment and the people, driven by curiosity.

Performance can be often found in his works. Michalis’ performances are frequently recorded in videos or combined with video installation, as “live” performance. 

There is always a tight connection between Michalis' works and the sites. In any specific realistic situation, he would create a multi-dimension world through the intervention of Video Installations. 

Virtual time and the real time overlap closely, how would the dimensions from virtual world intervene the perceptions to the real world, is what the artist is mostly concerned. And the Greek mythologies are often rethought and considered as metaphors in the works from Michalis. Such as the story about Prometheus, who secretly stole the fire to the earth and had to endure a repeated brutal corporal punishment from Zeus, stimulated a Lighting-video installation work, which Michalis has named as “Prometheus". This work will be brought by TAIFUN-Supervention to Beijing and presented in the meeting room of Heizhima Hutong 13. “Prometheus" is the artist’s participation in TAIFUN’s discussion, also a slight prank on the dependence on brightness of us.

At the opening day of TAIFUN-Supervention, On November 4, Friday, at 6PM, in Heizhima Hutong 13# Beijing, we will present a 20 minutes online performance (“Supervention” ) between Beijing and Duesseldorf, which is the newest work from Michalis based on the site of the exhibition.  Yes, the artist will definitely attend his show’s opening, in Beijing, no doubt.

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米哈利斯1967年出生于尼科西亚，塞浦路斯，1987年移居德国。米哈利斯的作品主要以影像为媒体，找寻周遭环境与被好奇心驱使的人们之间的关系。行为表演在米哈利斯的作品中经常被采用，他的行为表演通常被录制成为影像，或者配合影像装置，形成一种“现场型”的行为表演。

米哈利斯的创作与作品发生的地点一贯关系紧密。即在一个特定的现实环境，通过影像（Video Installation)的介入，创建一个多重维度的世界。其代表作，如2012年在杜塞尔多夫的KIT-Kunst艺术空间创作的“我的空间”(My space) ：由地下通道改造而成的展览场馆中散放着80多个交通监视摄像机、雷达和光化烟雾探测器，艺术家在这个几乎全封闭的黑暗空间的尽头， 即一块墙面上投射出一扇门的形象。影像继续，门被推开，艺术家从世界明亮的另一头探头探脑地出现，黑暗空间和其中充斥着的过剩的安保玩意似乎令艺术家困惑，他犹豫之后反身离去，关上了通往明亮世界的那扇门，观众们重新回到黑暗的现实。

虚拟时刻与即刻叠合，影像世界的时空维度如何干扰人们对现实世界的感知，是艺术家的兴趣点所在。希腊神话在米哈利斯的创作中也被频繁地思索和隐喻。如盗偷火种到人间而反复忍受天谴的普罗米修斯的故事，刺激了米哈利斯命名其灯光／影像装置作品。本次台风将在黑芝麻胡同13号的会议室呈现“普罗米修斯”(Prometheus)，它既是米哈利斯对台风讨论会的参与，也是一个关于人类灯火依存状态的小场恶作剧。 

而开幕当天，即11月4日周五下午6点，在黑芝麻胡同13号的展览空间所进行的连线行为表演，将成为米哈利斯为北京的空间考量过的发生在即刻的影像新作“伴随发生”(Supervention)。是的，身处杜塞尔多夫的米哈利斯将准时出席北京11月4日的开幕。

            

                                                                                            ---LICO FANG

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Supervention & Prometheus

 

The state in-between.

You are making a jump, and, for a second, you are in the air.

No Earth underneath your feet, no bounds.

Probably you will not even land in the same spot – could be, that you land somewhere else completely; in another land, another universe.

I have always found this transitional state “in-between” fascinating, this borderline where reality stops and something other begins. It has the quality of a ghost, haunted to carry on in this world, although long meant for the other.

Is Prometheus a ghost disrupting the lights of a room, or the one enabling the lights in the first place?

In greek Prometheus means “the Forethought”, the one who thinks ahead. A person, who has the imagination to think ahead, take action, and change the course of events. In the Greek Mythology, he was the Titan, who got in between gods and humans. A transitional Figure is always in between. Pointedly, his brother was Epimetheus, whose name means "hindsight", literally he was the "Afterthinker", whose lack of imagination brought the Box of Pandora upon men.

Prometheus instead thought that humankind's deserved civilizing arts and fire to shape their world.

Supervention is simple: you retrace the lines of a space. You, in the space, now.

An almost banal thing to do. Yet essential in your need to experience the space, even though you are in Germany and the space is in China. In whatever space one is, doing whatever task, is always essential to have feedback. Whether this is the tactile experience of the tiles on the floor, or the visual information transferred through the internet.

Space is what is outside us. It could be a room, a friend, a social environment. We interact with the space, our friends, our social environments – through feedback. A surgeon can operate directly on a body, or in our modern times, through distance – as long as he has the needed feedback. A body in a space without feedback, has no experience of the space, thus is a body lost in space. 

 

                                                                     

伴随发生 & 普罗米修斯

 

在大陆之间，

你做了一个跳跃动作，然后，忽然，你置身空中。

脱离了土地，没有了束缚。

也许你将不会落到原来的地点——可能是的，你降落到一处完全陌生之地；你在另一片土地上，另一个时空。

我总是发现这片变迁的地带是令人着迷的“中间存在者”，它是现实的暂停与另一个起点的分水岭。它像是一种妖魅，在被逐放中前行，意味深长。

普罗米修斯是扰乱一间屋子里光线的鬼魂，还是第一个制造光的神？

在希腊文化中，普罗米修斯意味着“深谋远虑”。一个人，如果能够具有预见前景的想象力，采取行动，改变事务的发展进程，便无疑是一位智者。在古希腊传说中，普罗米修斯是巨人，介于神与人之间。总是处于两者之间的中间角色。而他的兄弟厄庇墨透斯的名字即是“后见之明”的意思，毫不夸张的说，其人便是一位“事后诸葛亮”，是一位缺乏远见的人。

而普罗米修斯认为人类值得受到文明之火的改变。

伴随发生很简单：你追踪者空间中的一条路径。你，便身处其中。

你不得不采取一个可谓平庸的举动。你需要去体验这个空间，哪怕你在德国，而空间位于中国。无论是个什么样的空间，无论在其中做什么，接受回应必不可少——它可以是触摸地板瓷砖的体验，或者是通过网络传输的可视化信息。

空间就处于我们的外部——可以是一间房间，一位朋友，​一个社交场合。我们与空间互动，与朋友交流，社交场合也给予我们回应。一位外科医生能够直接在我们的身体上实施手术，也可以在当今进行远程操作——只要具备所需的反馈信息。如果身体在空间中无法得到回应，没有进行空间体验，那将是一个迷失于空间的身体。

 

                                    ---MICHALIS NICOLAIDES(米哈利斯 尼克莱徳斯)