Paky Vlassopoulou
The 3 founders of 3 137, we met in the early 2000’s in a newly established art school in north Greece with a very DIY attitude that encouraged collaborations. I am currently taking part in a, again, newly founded educational program, WHW Akademy, in Zagreb Croatia.
I found out about WHW collective several years ago, when we met Dan Perjovschi in the occasion of a lecture he gave in Onassis Cultural Center in Athens. We then invited him to participate in the second edition of our informal publishing house called Polar Bear, that commissions new artists’ books. (www.3137.gr)
3 137 started in 2012 focusing on exhibitions and gradually initiated more collaborative projects including numerous participants. Since the beginning, we were interested in questioning the role of artist initiatives in relation to the micro-scale of a city and to the mega structure of global networking. Our will is to co-create an artistic and non-artistic community that suggests another way of doing or experiencing art. Until today, one of our favorite moments was when we did a 3 day web radio station where we hosted more than 80 producers.
Except for one-off events, we work in long-term projects too. One of those is a research on the art production in the 70s in Greece. For this project, we have organized talks, screenings, an exhibition, an archive display, educational workshops and the following year, a book will be published in collaboration with Paraguay Press.
At the moment, we are working on a new long-term project, titled Gabriela, that could be related to Reshape project. Gabriela is a fictional, immaterial institution, inspired by the first intern who worked at 3 137 and sets up a discussion on labor issues in the art world while opening up to different, parallel and possible communities.
