“Mrs. Dalloway is always giving parties to cover the silence” ((Virginia Woolf, Mrs. Dalloway,1925)).

And this is what everyone does, isn’t it? Everyone except from Anna Dimitriou.

She throws a masquerade party, a bal de tête and we are all invited. It is a party that takes place in 1950’s in Athens, where the guests are time travelers and the host comes from Saturn. It is a party of silence that was frozen in time. Just like everything else.

Like Alice, Anna finds herself in a color land, among superficially crazy and falsely sane. In her collages she speaks about all those things. About all the different elements that coexist in such harmony that are no longer different. After all, the artist does not care where we are coming from or where we are going. She cares about the now and the times, the smells, and the travels it carries. Her artwork is also a journey. A journey in memories and past times that we did not experience but are so alive, so present, and so desirable.

Anna Dimitriou is not scared. She took her art out in the streets, to keep the lonely buildings company, to give people the sincerest paper eyes to look at and some color to rest upon. She doesn’t stop there. She now enters homes, canvases, screens, furniture, and our souls. And she takes everything down as she moves along; or everything that should be demolished. She keeps though the most important things. Because, if there is one thing, she teaches us, it’s not that we shouldn’t be afraid, but that we should not forget what’s meant to be remembered.

So, let’s get ready for the party. Let’s remove our social masks and wear our hearts. And let’s drink

to all the seas we didn’t swim into,

to all the skies we didn’t look at,

to all the parties we didn’t go to,

to all the laughter we didn’t dare to dream.

Anna will find us there. We will be there.

*** The "Bal de tête" installation was created for the Window Exhibition at Elephant Design.

It is a group project by Anna Dimitriou (Canndyblue), Fotini Noti (Woodtales) and Andreas Anthopoylos (Under construction at Athens). All the works-paintings and furniture presented in the setting of the exhibition are available to the public.