Medea Electronique
To say that the 20th century has provided mankind with a wealth of scientific and technological breakthroughs, while awfully common, is rather well-established. It is also well established that a number of those breakthroughs quickly found their way in peoples’ everyday lives. What might be less widely accepted or inadequately documented is that some of them, used and utilized by a few gifted men have in fact helped to move Art to an all-new terrain, both in terms of scope and form. Fine Art started being examined from the viewpoint of a new reality, a reality defined by the newly acquired ability to capture light-vision and air – sound by means of the New Media. This was only the beginning. If the term «New Media Arts» is hastily starting to express what contemporary art has been about the last couple of decades, then «Mixed Media Arts» explains the current holistic tendency to mix as a means to the end of completion. The wide availability of the new technologies and its maybe slow but deep penetration in modern life, have provided the artists with new creative tools, more powerful than ever , helping decisively towards the creation of a framework for a spectacular –if not dramatic – reinvention of art. Speaking of an approaching cosmogony would only be a slight exaggeration.
The group Medea Electronique was formed in Athens, Greece in 2006. Inspired by a play of words – Medea and Media, it was based on the artistic crux of the Stench on a white shirt team, namely Christos Laskaris and contemporary music composer Manolis Manousakis. Panagiotis Tsagarakis (computer programming, interactive technology) and Yannis Lolis (video art and computer animation) joined the former after they became acquainted by the appreciation of each other’s work. Sharing a tendency for innovation, an inherent drive towards novelty and a lust for art, the team moves in the field of New Media Arts, as the described roles of the team’s members give away.
The stench on a white shirt team was no stranger to mixed media arts, with a series of shows and events held in several venues in Athens and Thessalonika (Small music Theatre, Mylos) the play of the same name, a multimedia show treating human everyday reality through 15 short stories discussing the daily routine of work, family life, the hectic city grooves, politics, human relations. It has also staged the play

«22 miniatures and a theatrical scherzo» (April 2004)
Yianni Lolis, experienced animator and art director, has collaborated in the past with composer Manolis Manousakis in the latter’s “Tetrachromies”, a work presented in several venues in both Athens and Thessalonica, Greece’ s capital and second largest city respectively. The music of Tetrachromies, written for saxophone quartet and live electronics was performed my the Macedonian Quartet and Thodoris Zioutos; it worked in tandem with Lolis’ animation, leading performers and public to an interactive game with notes and images, natural and electronically manipulated.
Soprano Eleni Koutsoumbi and mezzo soprano Liliane Siba of european fame perform Peirama 1.
Peirama 1 (Experiment 1)
The first creative offering of the Medea Electronique team is entitled Peirama 1 (pronounced Peeramah Hena). It is based on a different reading of the Myth of Medea. The Chorus, the inner voice of Medea, is the human conscience reacting to what will follow and tries to change the course of the events and prevent the act of murder.
The psychological swings of the characters are of utmost importance to this play, and Medea’ s dilemma is repositioned on the moral-immoral, fair-unfair axes, given today’ s different circumstances. The modern day Medea, has different experiences in many domains. She has been raised in a different society with different religious beliefs, she has been bombarded with different pieces of information, her field of knowledge is greater. Recorded, radiophonic sounds are reproduced in parallel to her inner voice, making the latter indiscernible. Will this make a difference in her dramatic decision?
The play is in many ways diversified from a classic Euripides Medea. In terms of content, plot, presentation and rigidity.
Four versions of the Project can be staged depending on the availability of time, space and technology (complete version first, lightest version last): A live performance based on extended installation, a performers, VJ and Live Electronics combination, a VJ and live electronics performance and a pure video performance.
The installation performance largely relies on the combination of the human element and interactive technology to create a dynamic environment where visual and sonic data of the performance are continuously processed and re-imported into the play. Spectators are expected to express their sentiments towards the story; their reactions will be taken into account by the interactive system to modify the current environment. The positioning of multiple visual sources of moving picture, sound and light around the audience, will help towards that direction - the projected action will create a strong impact on the viewer as well as a feeling of ‘being there’. The spectator, by offering his recorded feedback will in a sense co-direct the play.
The Performers, VJ & Live Electronics performance takes a different approach, focusing on creating maximum impact from a limited set of resources. Vocal performers and musicians on stage, electronics performers and the VJ closely interact albeit within a more specifically regulated framework, to create once again the impression of a virtual environment oozing with dynamism.
The above version also exists as a VJ & Live electronics only performance. This is a more ‘portable’ performance when the number of crew and performers is limited. The existing videos and tape music are mixed and processed on the visual and aural domain in real-time.
Finally, the video performance comprises of a director’s cut of the project’s videos and music compositions in 5.1 or 7.1 surround sound and comes in DVD form.
Peirama 1 has already been successfully staged in the Benaki Museum of Modern Art in Athens, Greece, the Ionian Academy in Corfu, Greece and the NWEAMO festival in San Diego, USA, during Spring, Summer and Fall 2007 respectively.