'The Phantasmagoria of Defeat' (2013) @ 16th TDF.
Anastasia Christoforidou's short film doc 'The Phantasmagoria of Defeat' (2013) screened at the 16th annual Thessaloniki Doc Fest.
“Fuck Picasso!” That's what this cutting edge Greek pop artist says. Yorgos Tzinoudis is rapidly building a reputation for himself as the Andy Warhol of Greece who spends all his time creating art and making wine. During the 16th annual Thessaloniki Documentary Film Festival, filmmakers took one of Yorgos' wine tours of the wine museum at the Gerovassiliou vineyard where his car of skeletons, one of his favorite themes, greets visitors upon arrival. When asked about his unique black car covered with white skeletons, Yorgos explained his car as a metaphor for a traffic jam and the overwhelming sensation that we are all just dead-alive while we wait like zombies for everyone to continue their race to everywhere yet nowhere.
Other than wine and skeletons, Yorgos' favorite theme is cockroaches. He loves them because they represent an ugly truth most of us don't want to admit, that they have existed way before humanity and will exist long after. While Yorgos loves art, he critiques it and constantly searches for new ways to express himself with dark deathlike subjects using lively bright neon colors giving us a sense of his paradoxical style- dead-alive.
Yorgos is an eccentric visionary who locals of Thessaloniki praise for his innovations and for his mouth still full of real teeth. What other things does Yorgos like most in life other than art? “Basketball, boxing and curvy woman's legs.” When asked what his philosophy of life is, Yorgos replied: “What matters in life is not to win but to lose with grace.”
-Written by Vanessa McMahon
The film is an episode of the documentary series Portraits of Tomorrow.
Photos from Gerovassiliou vineyard by Vanessa McMahon
