designboom listens: andreas angelidakis’ music for making, remembering and escaping
grace jones, soft cell, new order and klaus nomi feature among the eclectic tracks the greek artist turns to for inspiration, focus and creative breakthroughs.
designboom listens to andreas angelidakis’ imaginary worlds
What does an artist listen to while building imaginary worlds? For Andreas Angelidakis, music sits alongside a practice that moves between sculpture, installation, architecture, digital culture and mythology. Based in Athens, Angelidakis draws on the ruins, stories and contradictions of the city around him while looking equally toward virtual worlds, pop culture and speculative futures. For the next edition of designboom listens, the Greek artist shares the songs that accompany his creative life, from the tracks that get him started in the studio to the ones that bring back a particular place or memory. His selections offer another way into a practice concerned with how we construct realities, remember the past and imagine what might come next.
Trained in architecture at the Southern California Institute of Architecture and Columbia University, Andreas Angelidakis has exhibited and curated internationally, including at documenta 14, the Chicago Architecture Biennial and, most recently, the Venice Art Biennale. But architecture is only one of the languages through which his work operates. His installations, sculptures and digital projects treat buildings as characters, ruins as archives, and technology as another space in which collective fantasies can take shape. His recent Escape Room for the Greek Pavilion at the 61st Venice Art Biennale, curated by George Bekirakis, turned the pavilion into a contemporary Plato’s Cave, questioning how images, history and constructed realities shape what we understand as truth. Here, the Athens-based artist tells us what he listens to while making, thinking, remembering and getting unstuck. Read on to discover the tracks behind his creative practice, and listen to the full playlist below.
the greek artist’s soundtrack, from the dancefloor to the studio
What song best captures your creative practice?
Andreas Angelidakis (AD): Soft Cell – The art of falling apart.
What is the very first track you play to clear the air and get inspired when starting a new project?
AD: Grace Jones – La Vie en Rose. It’s like burning audio sage in a space, everything becomes Grace.
Is there a song that instantly takes you back to a specific memory or place from your past?
AD: Yerba dell Diablo – Datura takes me back to FACTORY nightblub in 1993.
What song is stuck in your head right now?
AD: Venus square Mars, its not a song but a TikTok loop.
What is your ultimate 2 AM studio track, the one you secretly know every word to?
AD: Kostas Makedonas – Mono mia fora.
What song do you put on when you are stuck and need a breakthrough?
AD: New Order – Blue Monday.
What track is dominating your speakers this week, and is it influencing what you are making right now?
AD: This Mortal Coil – Song to the Siren.
What song helps you slow down and focus on the tiny, quiet details?
AD: Dead or Alive – Far too Hard.
If people were to wear headphones while experiencing your latest work, what one song should be playing?
AD: Frankie Goes to Hollywood – Relax, the Album.
What is your favorite album cover art?
AD: Sigue Sigue Sputnik – Flaunt it.
What is a track that best describes your favorite project you have worked on so far?
AD: Klaus Nomi – I Feel Love, for an installation at the Communist Party Headquarters in Paris, a project for Audemars Piguet Contemporary.
