The eco is a hit - it attracts the attention of the audience and the sponsors. I am of the people who swallow the bite of the eco and I still believe there are good initiatives that do not always become acts of activists and that people quietly and persistently try to improve not only their lifestyle but the lifestyle of the others too. But there are other people who turn the efforts into an act of activism and try to catch the others...
So, what is on my mind is that I had to walk for an hour to understand why I was angry after I left the Green Design Festival held in downtown Athens. The truth is that the amazing site of the organizers made me go there. Promises of eco-museum, proposals for eco-design and fashion, eco-library in the open and the imagination began galloping ... But in this case the virtual presentation has beaten the reality.
The exhibition is arranged in two open spaces fenced with wooden railings, located on both sides of another high wooden structure down the Syntagma Square. Pots of flowers are placed on the roof of this structure to illustrate what a green roof would look like. Great idea for the construction, I hope it will be kept as it casts a great refreshing shadow over a place that really needs some kind of a shed... The temperatures on the square exceed 40 degrees in the summer and one really feels like in an oven. But the idea is to imagine how Athens would look with green roofs.
The outdoor museum on the square houses a library under a wooden shed again. There visitors can read books about eco-design and eco-friendly way of life. There are really interesting titles.
The next exponent of the exhibition is an installation related to the noise pollution in Athens, where the decibels seriously exceed the allowed hearing health limits. You put headphones on your ears and stare at a screen that displays one of the junctures in Athens with the heaviest traffic. You hear the natural noises of the city and the screen displays every noise that our ears can not distinguish at all the fuss. Gradually, the list fills the entire screen - horn, whistle of a policeman, a forcing motorcycle, brakes. A little boy has put the headphones where the city is roaring in its natural decibel noise, reading with interest from the TV screen what he is hearing while watching the video shot at the junction.
I passed by to see a grid with hanging pots before me which is also an exhibit? Then follows an exhibition of ten posters, which is the most interesting presentation in the eco-museum. Not just because of the great posters, but also because of the incredible human stories that have inspired ten graphic designers to create these posters (as was the idea of their project).
Coming out of the corridor, where the large posters are hung, I get to a curved wall. If you go along it will lead you to a hidden round room the walls of which are covered with creeping plants. Fresh. I passed by. I got to the next installation - planted flowers sprinkled in a very complicated manner – there is a ceiling over them with transparent tubes that drop water into the soil. The method that explains on the plate what happens in the tubes seems very complicated. But it was very strange to me why the leaves of the flowers faded despite this whole complicated sprinkling system? I could go on and tell about the exhibition of clothes made of junk or waste stuff, but I will only mention the amazing bag made of football ball.
I expected to see some really functional solutions or something new that could be applied in reality but this did not happen. Are there projects? Or was not this the idea of the exhibition? But then why is it called eco-design? There are really many professionals in Athens who deal with modernization of buildings, and others who make gardens on verandas ... But perhaps the concept of the eco-design exhibition is to present the personal initiative and how it can change the landscape...
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