Μonemvasia
Over the immensity of the sea
and the centuries
Continuing his journey through the Greek Land artist photographer Kostas Papakonstantinou appears in magical and enchanting place.
Travels through time and the space, in the company of color, murmur of the sea and melody of the rock. Meets the modest beauty and the immensity of the sea, which embraces the "island", the "stone ship"…
Monemvasia. Lonely. Proud. Remote. Beautiful. Bathing in the waters of the Myrtoan Sea. Place of inspiration. Place for solitude.
The dream of thousands of people who every year cross this "single entry" and rise to the "stone ship" of Yiannis Ritsos, travel through the time, reconciling with the History.
Monemvasia, Malvaziya, Malvazui, Malvuazi, Malmzi, Little Gibraltar, Monovasia - its names are numerous, as well as its owners. In ancient times it was called the "Minos’s Cape," as Pausanias describes it in the "Laconia".
This is a place with history, glorious, but also hurt by its conquerors, today has its own aura, its peaceful and proud life.
Entry to the Monemvasia is like a journey through the time. It seems that there is no twenty-first century here.
Monemvasia lives out of time and is glad for that. For the Greeks it is not just another Byzantine fortress.
Monemvasia is the personification of the Byzantine, medieval legend of Greek civilization, which is not lost, but simply fell asleep for a moment and continues to exist in the arms of an invisible sea breeze.
"Monemvasia was for me a stone ship, on which I traveled around the world," - our great poet wrote about this place.
And indeed, here you feel ready to spread sails, the fears are being forgotten, the soul is freed from anxiety and boredom, and all this excellent landscape makes to want to love, to hope, to tremble, to live.
We often do not see what we look at.
The photographs of Kostas Papakonstantinou are teaching us to see beyond the immovable picture. By virtue of a deep artistic sensibility and mental sophistication of photographer, we are learning to distinguish the Perfect next to us, which we are losing.
His photographs tell us stories about that near to us, but we are forgetting.
And since I can no longer verbalize my feelings, I leave your imagination to travel together with the photographs of the outstanding artist Kostas Papakonstantinou.
Victoria Neferidi
