THE DOUBLE ONTOLOGY OF PUBLIC SPACE

My research project is about the double ontology of the Zappeion gardens in Athens as a representational space of national heteronormative identity in the daytime and a space of queer desire at night. Transgressing the private-public and indooroutdoor divide that marks the spaces of sexuality in modernity, the sexual encounters between men are marked by the affective sensations of the nocturnal sublime of the Zappeion gardens; a public space heavily related to the modern Greek cultural identity and encapsulated in an urban realm that creates representations of historical continuity, visual coherence and presence. The research topic is how to present in a synchronous way the complex relationship among two different temporalities of the same space and what performative means and actions have to be utilized in order to present some of the nocturnal sensorial experiences of the embodied sexual encounters during the daytime.