
In this new work, the artist has embarked on a different, more nostalgic, emotive path which although clearly intimates the world around us, also is imbued with a romantic, escapist tendency, thus adding a new dimension to her work which hitherto has been entirely foregrounded in reality.
To enter, the viewer has to traverse a bridge over a “sea” of shot-gun cartridges and a space illuminated by fairground lights which spell the title of the work. Three mannequins – two men and a woman – in military attire, the focal point of the installation, beckon the viewer into the second space; the sound of music from a piano – atop which are toppled toy figurines of the protagonists of World War II – fills and animates the room; framed paperback covers of war novels, and spy stories “decorate” a wall; and suddenly theviewer becomes complicit in a deliberate spectacle of conflicting elements; on the one hand, one senses the backdrop and the angst of war, on the other, one is immediately thrust into the joyous, escapist atmosphere reminiscent of period musicals. [...]
Papadimitriou plays on the associations the image of the soldier evokes: from the idealized hero, to the personification of dread; a symbol of recognition, anonymity, security or resentment, a perpetual nomad who today has been reduced to fighting for ideas that may not necessarily be his own.
Katerina Gregos
Excerpts from “No More Heroes?” in exh. cat. We’ll Meet Again, pp. 45-46.