You will only see a flash of light
by Smaragda Nitsopoulou
Research & project
My research is rooted in fragmented memories, silence, and the black hole of secrecy that defined my childhood. Very few memories from that time remain intact – perhaps a defense mechanism in response to living in a traumatic household. What does remain, however, has guided over a decade of my artistic practice. Through moving image, I try to explore, reclaim, and sometimes simply sit with the mess of memory, trauma and place.
Raised in 1990s Northern Greece, I lived with my mother’s volatile love and my grandmother’s quiet descent into Alzheimer’s. We were taught silence, building our lives around that which we could not name. During that silence, on the 23rd of September 1998, the hostage crisis involving Sorin Matei unfolded live on television.
My exploration takes the form of a feature-length hybrid documentary, blending together elements of observation, memory, reconstruction and fiction. Through this hybrid approach, I seek not only to revisit the physical and emotional landscapes of my past, but also to question the very possibility of returning ‘home’ – when home itself was, and perhaps remains, a contested, unstable terrain.
Smaragda Nitsopoulou
Smaragda Nitsopoulou is a visual artist, researcher, and film director based in Amsterdam and Athens. Her work explores themes of memory, life, and death within both personal and collective contexts. Nitsopoulou’s practice bridges filmic narratives with three-dimensional objects, aiming to address psychosocial, geopolitical, and visual culture concerns. Through her immersive use of cinematic language, she delves into absence, absence among the living, and the discontent that arises in response to contemporary culture.
Her work incorporates found footage, natural resources, and quotidian structures, often resulting in interactive installations that invite reflection on the experience of absence. Nitsopoulou has exhibited at numerous international festivals and art fairs, including Documenta 14, the Slavonian Biennale, and the Larnaca Biennale, among others. Her works have garnered recognition in the global art community, and she has received various fellowships and awards, such as the Artworks Fellowship (2018) and the "Improvisa-Life in Motion" residency (Athens, Lublin, and Ljubljana, 2020-2021).
Her artistic journey is marked by an ongoing inquiry into how visual culture, memory, and absence intersect, creating spaces for viewers to reflect on larger, often unseen, societal forces. Through both her films and installations, Nitsopoulou invites audiences to reconsider the implications of these themes in their own lives.