[Memories from an upcoming war]
“Asphodel Meadow” was shot on a single day, March 22, 2018, when a thick veil of African dust covered central Crete. It is a literal descent of a slope within the boundaries of the family property, a spontaneous response to waking up to an alien environment.
The mesmerising effect of the red haze assailing the all-familiar area of home spoke of war in more than one ways. From a scientific aspect it was the surfacing war of environmental crisis. However, the imagery offered by the nearby hills and groves resembled the colours in pictures on the internet of cities and areas in the Middle-East devastated by war; the phenomenon of that day coincided with a period of augmenting tension in Greece’s foreign affairs.
In retrospect, the photographs appear as a reddish echo of John Gossage’s stroll in “The Pond” in their sequence and mundane content. At the time though, going down the slope and up again felt more like a metaphor for a homeric descent to the Asphodel Meadows of Hades that are constantly covered with ashes, and the consequential ascent.
