AEF2026: Sergey Khismatov: Video Ensembles

This summer, Athens Epidaurus Festival's main city venue, the former industrial complex in Pireos 260, celebrates 20 years as one of the city’s most vital cultural meeting points. Under the artistic direction of Michail Marmarinos, this year’s landmark programme unfolds across two months of theatre, dance, music, performance, and multidisciplinary works, bringing together more than 50 events by acclaimed international artists alongside some of the most exciting voices from Greece’s contemporary scene. Pireos 260 will live through the Athenian summer as a dynamic space where emerging creators, established names, and curious audiences come together to explore what contemporary performance can be today. New collaborations, technology-driven works, and immersive experiences sit alongside bold theatrical productions, live music, and cutting-edge choreography.

Amongst these innovative technology-driven works is Video Ensembles by Russian composer and artist Sergey Khismatov, presented as part of the festival's "C_Music NOW" strand. Conceived during the global isolation of the pandemic, this unique audiovisual format merges Khismatov's passion for spatial sound diffusion with the moving image to create sharp, sensory bursts of modern commentary. Characterised by a witty and audacious brio, his art brilliantly channels Mark Twain’s famous reflection: "Laughter is the greatest weapon we have as humans and the one we use the least."

The installation inside the Pireos 260 Foyer showcases three distinct, meticulously edited pieces that utilise everything from traditional orchestral crescendos to the raw vocabulary of noise. In POLITUNES, Khismatov isolates the verbal hesitations and vocal awkwardness of politicians and populists during live speeches, crafting a micro-composition where the hilarious meets the chilling. SUONO POVERO builds a literal choir out of rubbish—capturing the crinkle of crushed packaging and discarded bags to comment on ecological ruin, nodding directly to the Arte Povera movement. Finally, ROTONDA transforms audio clips of creaking doors sent by friends across the globe into a mournful sonic landscape, acting as a poignant metaphor for immigration and the human gestures of acceptance and exclusion.