The Cyprus Pavilion
56th International Art Exhibition – la Biennale di Venezia
Two Days After Forever
Christodoulos Panayiotou

Two Days After Forever is anchored by a solo presentation by the artist Christodoulos Panayiotou at the Palazzo Malipiero. It takes as its starting point the invention of archaeology and its instrumental role in forging the master narrative of history. Utilising a diversity of strategies, Panayiotou questions how tradition is formed and authorship and authenticity governed. Through an act of meticulous staging, the artist critiques modernity’s hyperbolic and aspirational fabric and its inconsistent notion of progress. Ancient tesserae, borrowed from the Archaeological Museum in Nicosia are recomposed as ephemeral artworks, before being returned to their home in Cyprus where they will revert to their former status as anonymous ruins at the end of the exhibition.

Two Days After Forever adopts a multiplicity of modes – it is an exhibition that sleeps, awakens and embodies different temporalities. As such, it manifests as an anthropology of movement in the pavilion and beyond, engaging with different publics around the Mediterranean. Central to this choreography is Panayiotou’s variation on La Bayadère’s Death of Nikiya, which puts archaeology and the ultimate balletic position of Arabesque in direct conversation through an ongoing performance that merges biography with historical imaginaries.