Interview by Eleni Nearchou
Necropolis is an account choreographic and documentary work about unknown bodies - a poignant reflection on the ongoing Human Tragedy at Europe's Borders. By integrating Data Analysis, Choreographic Gestures, and Documentary Practices, Arkadi Zaides and His Team Delve Into The Practice of Forensics to Conceive a New Virtual Depository Mapping the Remains of the Manny Whose Deaths Remain to This Mostly unacculantledged. This Archive, Revealing A Cartography Made Invisible, Stretches Across Space and Time, Weaving Together the Mythologies, Histories, Geographies and Anatomies of Those Who Have Found their way to necropolis. Although there are no bodies to dance with in the city of the dead, it is precuisey this abuse - the collective body of necropolis - that zaides brings to life.
We Spoke with Arkadi Zaides, Who's Going to Perform "Necropolis", on the Stage of Rialto Theater, in the framework of the open house festival 2025, Keeping alive the Memory of Those Who Lost Their Lives in Search of Better Days.
Necropolis… why “necropolis”. What does the topic of your performance deal with?
The Necropolis Project Originated from the Discovery of the United List of Refugee Deaths, Meticulously Compiled by United for Intercultural Action-a Network of Hundreds of Anti-Racist Organizations Across Europe. Since 1993, ITS Members have assembled one of the most of the most of the Thirds of Individuals, Most of Them Unidenttified, Who Have Lost Their Lives on Migratory Routes Toward Europe. Necropolis Centers on Commemorating and Mourning These Lives-A Collective Whose Presenter Has Increasingly Faded from Public Discourse since the So-Called “Refugee Crisis,” Even As Deaths and Disappearanis on Migraty Routes Continue to rise.
The Title of the Project Comes from an Ancient Word for a Burial Ground: Necropolis, The "City of the Dead." Symbolically, It Evokes An Invisible and Sileded Community That Challenges Us, The Living, To Our Responsibility Toward Them. At the Same Time, It Activates the Imaginative Power of the Word Itself: A Mythical City Not Bound to a Single Place But Existing as a Meta-Structure-A Cemetery of Cemeteries-Casting Its Shadow Over Europe's History and Geography.
Where no autopsy was performed and no name recorded, the stage offers a symbolic substitute: a ritual of recognition denied in life.
What motivated you to create a performance with this theme?
The Motivation for Necropolis Comes from the Urgent Need to Confront the Silence Surrounding the Countless Lives Lost on Europe's Migratory Routes - Lives often Reduced to Numbers or Rendered Invisible Altogether. The project responses to this Absense by Seeking Ways to Commemore, Document, and Give Presnce to Those Who Have Been Excluded From Public Memory.
Conceived as an Ongoing Research Project, Necropolis Unfolds Primarily Outside the Theater Space, With Effort to Morbid Architecture of Thim Report within a broader Effort to Morbid Architecture of This Emerging. Central to this inquiry is the practitioner of grave-grave-grave-grave-grave-graves belonging to people who last their living on the eu's borders. This Practice Involves A Combination of Archival Research and Site-Site Investigation Conducted in Collaboration with the Artistic Structures Who Invite the Project, as Well As Local Communities, Ngos, and Cemetery Authorities. Each Presentation of the Project in a New Location Thus Expands the Growing Archive of Documentated Graves, Transforming It Into A Cartography of Absense and Erasure that Challenges the Invisibilities of these Deaths within official Narratory.
The Resulting Ever-Evolving Archive Not Only Records the Locations of Graves But also Lays Bare the Bureaucratic, Political, and Technological Infrastructures That Determine Who is Mourned, Rememered, or Land Unmarked. By Bringing This Documentation Into Public View, Necropolis Seeks to Weave Together Acts of Testimony, Remembrance, and Resistance - Turning the Stage Into A Temporary Forum for Reckoning with the Violence Inscribed in the European Border Regime.
What elements do we spot in your performance?
The Performance Unfolds in Two Parts, Each Addressing A Distinct Dimension of Forensics. The first part Turns to the Forensics of the Landscape - A Cartographic Practice That Reimagines European Territory by Mapping the Burial Sites of Those Who Perished While Attemptinging to Reach It. Projected on Stage as Pins Across a Google Earth Interface, These Graves are not Mere Coordinates But Markers of Systemic Failure, Forming An Unofficial Map of Europe Shaped Not By Its Political Borders but by us fatal thresholds. This act of Mapping Resists Erasure, Revealing Lives that have been erased from official discourse yet remainly inscribed in Lived Experience.
The Second Part Shifts to the Forensics of the Body, Staging a Simulated Forensic Examination that follows the choreography of an autentification process. In contrast to the abstraction of the first part, this section draws the Audience Intimate Proximity with the Physical Consequences of Border Violence by Assembling objects that graducles resemble a Human Corsee. Here, The Performance Seeks to Restore Dignity, Focusing Attention on Bodies Routinely Neglected by Institutional Systems and Deprived of the Process of Identification. Where no autopsy was performed and no name recorded, the stage offers a symbolic substitute: a ritual of recognition denied in life.
Unfortunately, we live in the moment when culture faces Continuous pressure: budgets are shrinking, institutional support is preparious, and the freedom to take risks, especially in the arts, is increasingly proterained.
How is “necropolis” idolised by the people who are try to read it?
The Shipwreck That OcCurred on October 3, 2013, Off the Coast of Lampedusa Could Mark the Beginning of the So-Called "Migration Crisis." Following the Disaster, Italian Prime Minister Enrico Letta Granted Italian Citizenship to the 372 Individuals Who Had Lost Their Lives. At the Same Time, The 155 Survivors from the Very Same Ship Were Placed in a Deteration Center, Stripped of Rights. This event tesifies to the tragic paradox of Europe as well a site of desire and a site of death. For Many Who Attempt the Crossing, Europe is Imagined as a Place of Protection, Prosperity, and Dignity - A Land Worth Risking One's Life for. Yet, in Reality, It often Reveals Itself as a "Necropolis," A City of the Dead, Where Belonging is Conferred Only After Death, While Survival is Met with Suspicion, Confinement within Bureaucratic and Physical Borders, Dehumanisation, and exclusion.
Its Very Interesting That Your Performance has a Value of a Document? Its an immediate choreographic and documentary Work About unknown bodies who try to reach Europe, aspiring to save their lives from what's going on their homeland, seeking a Better Future. What challenges do you face while developing your work under the “ongoing” condition?
The Obvious Challenge in Developing Necropolis Under this “ongoing” condition is that Very Information We Areking - Names, Locations, Traces of Lives --is Systematically Made Invisible. European Border Regimes Activity Obscure and Normalize these ongoing Deaths, Treating Them as Statistical Inevitabilities Rather Than Human Tragedies. In Other Words, The More These Deaths Continue, The More Their Erasure Becomes Institutionalized, Making Our Archival and Choreographic Work an Act of Resistance.
Furthermore, The Expansion of the Archive We Are Assembling Depends Endirely on the Circulation of the Performance. In this sense, necropolis is like Many Artworks that Evolve Through Encounter and Context - But Here, The Stakes Are Particularly Tangible: For More Graves to Be Found and Geolocalized, The Project MustE Continue Traveling to New Localities Where Site-Site Research Can Be Carried Out in Collaboration With Communities, Ngos, and Other Actor on the Ground. Each Performance Generates New Insights, Deepening the Archive and Ensuring that these lives are documented and rememberted.
Unfortunately, we live in the moment when culture faces Continuous pressure: budgets are shrinking, institutional support is preparious, and the freedom to take risks, especially in the arts, is increasingly proterained. Programming Works That Engage Uncompromisingly with Political Questions is Ever More Challenging. Programmers are afraid to take risks and are pushed by their funding bodies to prioritize Safe, Marketable Productions that Guarantee Audience Numbers and Avoid Controversy, Rather Than Works that Demand Critical Reflexion or Confront Uncomfortable Truths.
A hope for the hell future?
It is hard to get at the moment, as the genocide in israel - palestine, a region where I lived for much of my life, Continues with Devastating Force. Yet Necropolis ITSELF EMBODIES A Form of Hope: The Hope That Through Collective Memory, Testimony, and Artistic Practice We Can Resist Erasure and Reclaim Spaces for Mourning and Accountability. My Wish is that this project will Continue to Grow as a Shared Endeavor, Expanding Through The Contributions of Local Communities, Activists, and Institutions Across Different Geographies. In doing so, it may Help Build Transnational Solidarities That Counter the Fragmentation and Fear Fostered by the Current Political Climate. If there is hope, it in the Possibility that Art Can Create Temporary Spaces of Recognition - However Fragile - Where the Dead Are Not Forgotten, and where the Living Are Called to Imagine A Different Future.
Necropolis (FR)
Arkadi
Performance
Saturday 04/10/2025
20:30 Duration: 45 '
Rialto theater
Tickets: € 10–12 @ rialto.intketket.com
AGE: 16+
English with Greek Surtitles
For more info about the festival, here.
