Melisma II

Melisma is first introduced in 2022, following the mega-wildfire of Northern Evia in August 2021, as an initiative of the Hellenic Ministry of Culture. It is an annual cycle of educational and artistic practices designed by the Learning & Participation Department of the Greek National Opera (GNO). For the 2024–2025 season, Melisma II carries out research and educational work focusing on the arts, techniques, traditions, and customs of Northern Evia.

Malisma II is carried out by:
Artistic director: Anna Tzakou
Artistic Team: Maria Olga Athineou (theatre practitioner, processworker), Stamatis Pasopoulos (musician, composer), Anna Tzakou (director, Ph.D in Performing Arts), Anna Housiada (visual artist).

Research

During the period August–October 2024, the artistic team conducts research on the arts, techniques, traditions, and customs of Northern Evia in three geographical zones: Istiaia/Edipsos, Limni/Mantoudi, and Agia Anna/Vasilika. Besides the investigation of cultural and historical archival material of the area, the research process was enriched by participatory ethnographic processes through which the artistic team became deeply engaged with the landscape and its communities. These approaches of exploring the landscape as a sensorial, embodied, rhythmic narrative, constituted the foundation of artistic/ thematic direction of the program’s workshops.

Artistic Workshops

The research shapes the direction of the program’s workshops, which begin to take place sequentially across all three zones starting in November 2024. The workshops bring together approximately 150 participants, aged 6 to 80, divided into 13 different groups of local residents, and are hosted in two upper secondary schools (lyceums) and one primary school in the area.

The methodology combines contemporary practices in music, visual arts, site-specific performance, theatre, and individual and group processwork. Special emphasis is placed on the experiential exploration of identity in relation to the land, the landscape, and memory, fostering conditions for an open dialogue between the traditional and the contemporary. The question regarding the relationship between the old and the new becomes the core dramaturgical focus of the walking music performance In the Land of Lillies which takes place in July 2025 as the final event of the overall program.

For the workshop documentation see here: