Six documentaries are screened during the exhibition at the Benaki Museum in collaboration with ERT (every Saturday and Sunday from 22/9 to 25/11/2012), helping visitors and schoolchildren analyze the human, political and cultural impact of population exchange, displacement and migration.
Visitors and students are encouraged to explore the meaning of identity: how age-old cosmopolitan societies across the world had enabled people of different ethnic and religious groups to have multiple identities and to live together.
The DOCUMENTARY CLASSROOM films can be made available for schools and community groups upon request. Special screenings can be organised for schools at the museum (contact the Benaki Museum Dpt. of Educational Programmes, tel. 210 3671067-070
Please contact us: info@anemon.gr
FILMS
• MY HOUSE WITHOUT ME / MÓJ DOM
Poland, Great Britain 2012; Directed: Magdalena Szymków; 29 minutes
Two women, one house. An intimate story about a Pole and a German placed by war on enemy sides and their parallel lives that are accidentally brought together.
The film reflects on the concepts of invaders, victims, guilt and forgiveness. It confronts different experiences and their paradoxical similarities. It deals with the controversial subject of the post-war settlement.
• WAGAH
Germany 2009; Director: Supriyo Sen; 14 minutes
Each night the only border crossing between India and Pakistan on a 1000km stretch becomes the sight of an extraordinary event. Thousands of people gather to witness the ritual closing of the border, after which the masses get as close as possible to the gate to greet their former neighbors. This "festival" is therefore on the one hand a celebration of the partition, but on the other hand also the only connecting element.
• EXPELLED FOR PEACE. AS GREEKS AND TURKS WERE DIVIDED
Germany 2003; Directors: Simone Sitte & Osman Okkan; 54 minutes
In July 1923, Greece and Turkey signed the Treaty of Lausanne.
These supposed peace measures, celebrated as a foreign policy success, had devastating consequences: cruel expulsion, refugee misery and impoverishment. It was the first state-sanctioned "ethnic cleansing" of the 20th century.
The authors followed the lives of several refugees to question what had been taboo for decades between the two countries. They also join two displaced persons after 80 years to visit their homeland again, a place that is in fact only "a stone’s throw" away.
• TWICE A STRANGER, directed by Andreas Apostolidis & Yuri Averof, 52' -2011 (Greece, ERT/Anemon)
The film examines the historical background that led to the Treaty of Lausanne in 1923, and in parallel gives voice to surviving refugees on both sides of the border. The enormous consequences of population transfer, told through the common ground of human experience: "Birth in one place, growing old in another place. And feeling a stranger in the two places."
Saturdays: 09.15 – 10.10, Sundays: 10.20 - 11.10 (for ages 15+)
• WOMEN OF CYPRUS, directed by Vassiliki Katrivanou, 70' - 2009 (USA-Cyprus)
In the spring of 2004, Maria, a Greek Cypriot, and Zehra, a Turkish Cypriot, cross the green line dividing Cyprus since the war of 1974, to visit family homes they have not seen for thirty years. Thus begins the personal journey of these women as the film follows them through their past, haunted by war and pain, to their present search for reconciliation and common ground.
Saturdays: 10.30 – 11.40 (for ages 12+)
• MY SWEET CANARY, directed by Roy Sher, 60’ - 2010 (Israel, Greece, France, ERT/ARTE)
The story of three young musicians from Greece, Turkey and Israel that embark on an exciting musical journey, to reveal the story of the first and most famous Greek-Jewish Rebetiko singer, Roza Eskenazi. From Istanbul to Thessaloniki and Athens, the film brings to life a forgotten world in which different ethnic and religious groups peacefully co-existed.
Saturdays: 12.00 – 13.20, Sundays: 11.30 - 12.50 (for ages 12+)
• A MUSICAL JOURNEY WITH DOMNA SAMIOU
Directed by Fotos Lambrinos, 36' - 1977 (Greece, ERΤ)
A documentary about the musical tradition of Farasa in Cappadocia. Domna Samiou meets with refugees from Farasa, who settled in Plati of Imathia.
They talk about history, mythology and the folk culture of Cappadocia and about their life there and in Greece. Songs and dances of the area are performed.
Saturdays: 13.40 - 14.15, Sundays: 13.10 - 13.40 (for ages 10+)
• MUSIC EVENING: DOMNA SAMIOU
Directed by Dafni Tzaferi, 56' - 1977 (Greece, ERΤ)
The documentary follows Domna Samiou as she records, collects and researches traditional Greek songs. Domna Samiou also performs famous folk songs like “Giorgitsa mou”, “Armenaki”, “Samarina” and sings with Dionysis Savvopoulos.
Saturdays: 14.35 - 15.30, Sundays: 14.00 - 14.56 (for ages 10+)
• THE DIVISION OF CYPRUS
Directed by A. Apostolidis & Y. Averof, 2011 (Greece, ERT/Anemon)
From the outbreak of community violence in 1963/4, to the Greek Cypriot military coup in 1974 and the subsequent Turkish invasion, 180 000 Greek Cypriots were forcibly displaced to the south of the island and 50.000 Turkish Cypriots were forcibly displaced to the north. Greek and Turkish Cypriots narrate their personal experiences of displacement in the 1960's and 70's.
Saturdays: 15.50 – 16.35, Sundays: 9.15 - 10.00 (for ages 15+)
Information and reservations:
Benaki Museum, Mon. – Thur. 10.00 -14.00, tel. 210 3671015
Dpt. of Educational programmes, Mon. – Thur. 10.00 -15.00, tel. 210 3671067 - 070
