Dimitris Michalakis

Burnout

[ EPF 2013 FINALIST ]

Large demostrations in Athens since 2010, police repression, violence and irrational use of tear gas, 3500 suicides, massive unemployment (26%) and unpaid work – two out of three young people are unemployed – abolition of health structures in the public sector, closure of mentally ill units, hundreds pawnshops mushrooming all over the country, huge increase in drug addicts and prostitution, homeless people and people who found themselves in the streets, continuous strikes are the consequences of the economic crisis in Greece.

This crisis is not just a financial one. It is a systemic crisis with multiple dimensions; political, social and cultural ones. It is in fact a historical breakthrough and all options for the future are open. The country actually lives in war conditions.

 

 

I have been reading about Weimar Republic in Germany in the 1920s, the financial crash of 1929 in America, the oil crisis of the 70’s. Now, in Greece history seems to repeat itself in variations.

Half of my friends are unemployed, my parents kept warm with a little stove as they couldn’t afford heating oil this year, my father, in a poor health condition, will soon complete 50 years of work, most of them spent in two jobs, my sister emigrated after having been unemployed, an elderly man I met in the center of Athens sold his gold teeth for a few euros, in my neighborhood workers in one of the largest steel mill of the country went on strike for 272 days after the dismissal of 110 colleagues and a 50% pay cut.

I have traveled and seen countries full of misery, poverty and violence, I have been always moved, but I couldn’t really empathize. In Egypt, where I traveled in 2009, youth unemployement was 90%. In Greece youth unemployment has now reached 65%.

It all begins from my surroundings and ends up on me. Burnout has to do with my own crisis too; I do know it is a part of my life deeply experiential that started four years ago, but i still do not know when and how it will end.

 

 

Bio

Dimitris Michalakis was born in 1977 in Elefsina, Greece. He studied photography at the Focus School of Photography in Athens. Since 2004 he has been a regular contributor to K Magazine, (Kathimerini Sunday edition), and the E Magazine (Eleytherotypia Sunday edition). His photographs have been published in various Greek and international publications (Spiegel, Die Zeit, Rolling Stones Magazine). He has traveled on journalistic missions to more than 30 countries, mainly in ex Soviet Countries.

Solo Exhibitions:

2013: ‘Burnout’ (in progress), Coalmine Gallery, Zurich, Swiss

2010: ‘NATO Avenue’, Cheapart Gallery, Athens, / Thessaloniki Biennial, Greece

2008: ‘Old School’ Sen Yung, China Gamma Photo Agency China’s Cultural Olympiad

Group Exhibitions:

2012: ‘NATO Avenue’, LUMIX Festival for  Young Photojournalism,Hannover, Germany

2011: ‘Muslim World’, Sismanoglio Megaro, Istanbul, Turkey

2011: ‘NATO Avenue’, Bursa’s Photography Festival, Turkey

 

Related links

Dimitris Michalakis

 

 

4 thoughts on “Dimitris Michalakis – Burnout”

  1. It’s all to easy to get court up in the macroeconomics we hear in the news. It can become all to easy to forget the people living on the ground. Thank you.

Comments are closed.