Nicosia International Airport revealed in upcoming exhibition

“How much truth can a photograph contain? How much history can a photographic moment capture, and how much emotion can the photographic lens withstand?” asks an upcoming exhibition at Isnotgallery Contemporary. Photographs by Andros Efstathiou are about to go on show under the auspices of President Nikos Christodoulides.

Through a series of photographs that have acquired a life of their own, Cypriot photographer Efstathiou records the history of the island over the last 50 years in a manner that is at once concise, descriptive and utterly revealing.

“This collection tells the truth and nothing but,” says its creator, stressing that the public was touched by the power of this truth from the very start, both in Nicosia (2012) and in Thessaloniki, where it was shown at the Photobiennale (2014). It was later exhibited at the Evripides Art Gallery in Athens (2017) and at the European Central Bank in Frankfurt (2017).

Deploying a gaze with a distinctively metaphysical aesthetic and a theatrical setting with real protagonists, Efstathiou sends a message of return and rebirth, while using a series of contrasts to highlight human pre-eminence among the ruins of the past.

In Efstathiou’s photographs, the dilapidated Nicosia Airport ceases to be a static architectural relic and is transformed into a living space. The images are recorded and exhibited as the disjointed flashes of memory of a group of people who witnessed the last inbound flight on July 20, 1974.

Donning period-correct uniforms, they are captured in scenes with horror film undertones, seemingly awaiting the announcement of the next flight.

The adventure-filled story of the photo shoot brims with the perseverance, determination and daring of the Cypriot photographer’s effort to overcome the relevant obstacles, those related to the prohibitions regarding the Dead Zone, as well as the clichés that inevitably colour the perception of a historic building, which in this case is seen as a symbol of partition and the Green Line.

“It could be the basis of a film script,” the photographer notes, an apt description when one considers the five-year duration of his persistent ‘wandering’ in the airport area, which began with the curating of an exhibition that happened to converge with a round of the bicommunal peace talks.

As he puts it, “the idea of photographing people at the dilapidated Nicosia Airport gestated in my mind for years”. What paved the way were a dose of good fortune and sheer determination, as these images had been impressed upon him since childhood. His generation did not live through the war. Rather, the telling and retelling of the events of the Turkish invasion created the images in his mind, and strengthened the desire to submit his own testimony on a building that is a symbol of the recent history of Cyprus.

The work exhibited by Efstathiou makes it possible for Cypriots who lived through the invasion to see reflections of themselves in these photographs, while for younger generations it is like a time machine that brings a substantial piece of the recent history of the island back to life.

As for Efstathiou himself, “no matter how many years pass, I will carry this work with me…” he says, emphasising that this project now defines him both as a photographer and as a person while the Nicosia International Airport remains abandoned and under the control of the United Nations.

Nicosia International Airport

Photography exhibition by Andros Efstathiou. December 13-February 6. Isnotgallery, Nicosia. Opening night: 7pm.Tuesday – Friday: 10am – 1pm, 3pm – 6pm. Saturday: 10am – 2pm. Tel: 99-569498