Arch of Triumph

Arch of Triumph 2004
Sundry objects, rope, metal construction
12x4x2,50m
Athena by Art
junction of Kallirrois, Ardittou Strs. and Vouliagmenis Ave, Athens
(cur.: Christina Petrinou)

Behind Hadrian’s Arch, near the church of Ayia Fotini, Andreas Savva installed an Arch of Triumph inside of which he created an anarchic web. Captured and suspended in the web were various objects (chairs, tables, etc.) that the artist collected from the streets of Athens.
In 1942 Marcel Duchamp “obstructed” the viewing of the works in the exhibition, First Papers of Surrealism, when he created a web from a mile of string. Savva, in contrast, provides a way of mounting/exhibiting his objects that contributes to their further deterioration, given many of these objets trouvés are broken apart by the tightened ropes.
With this work Savva focuses on the refuse of contemporary culture in urban centers. It is purely anti-heroic monument, in which the architectural design of the arch coexists with the freely knitted ropes.
The artist first manifested his desire to give form to his web in Digestive Tract (2000). By 1993 Savva had already begun developing such vrinthine webs, as in opportunist, which he hung in a deserted field or in a neoclassical house, accelerating the deterioration of the space. In Space Eater (1999) he captured the items, such as desks, ladders, etc, found in a gallery that was about to close. In Captive (2001) he trapped roses, no longer just in a web but now in balls of ice, whose beauty appeared through the ice but remained inaccessible, decomposing as the ice melted.
Christina Petrinou