Where are you from ? (country, influences, background...)

I was born in Greece, but I'm 1/2 Norwegian, so I grew up in a strange mix
of two very different cultures, spending half the time in Greece and 1/2 in
Norway.
I studied architecture at SCI-ARC in Los Angeles, and through my friend Jim
Isermann, I got to know the contemporary art scene at a great moment.
Later on I met Adelina von Furstenberg, and through her I learned a lot more
about contemporary art. At more or less the same time I did my masters at
Columbia University which had just introduced the digital department.

How did you meet M Manetas ?

I met Miltos through the gallerist Emily Tsingou, when he was in Greece
participating in an exhibition by Adelina.
At the time neither of us had a computer, it was 1994, and I was just
leaving for New York to study at Columbia.
We met again a few months later and we both had our first Macs, and where
totally addicted.

What kind of collaboration do you have with him and with the orphans?

I dont know if collaboration is the right term. I would say we are part of
the same landscape, a landscape in the sense of intelectual topography.
So of course we collaborate on many things, discuss ideas, judge each
others' work and quite often we do projects together.

You are the EO frontstore architect ? what were the main ideas at the origin
of this project what were your constraints ?

At the time, Manetas was doing the famous "cables on the floor" paintings,
and all his visual landscape was cables and hardware, everywhere, which is
almost unavoidable when you have many computers in a space.
My first reaction for EO was no cables, no hardware, no floor and to
definetly avoid the classic "computers on tables" view. So I decided to take
everything off the floor, and have it hanging from the ceiling.
Then the main concept was to  have the space function as a drop-down
navigation menu, a space designed as a website. You can close the menu and
see just a screen, or open it to work.
Basically EO is a screen, so when the menu-workstations are closed, all you
see is an empty space and a screen floating in the back. I made the basic
equivalence that a storefront is a screen.
The only constraint was the budget, but I decided to design the space as it
should be in an ideal world, and then build a demo-version instead.

Do you work differently to build spaces for internet or for the physical
space ?
Not really. What I usually try to achieve is a very abstact quality, a
moment when you dont know if what you see is a space or a screen, a building
or a computer rendering.
So in the built projects, I try to create this moment with materials that
are native to the built world, I try to achive virtuality not with
technology but with regular building materials.
This moment could be described as NEEN, which is an abstract term in itself,
something that we recognize but cannot describe.

I guess i understood that you will create the Neen architecture for the
villette numerique's performance. How do you imagine Neen's world ? and then
how will you create it with the help of the others ?
At this stage the NEEN world will be on the Active Worlds platform, which
I'm familiar with since many years.
I dont know yet what it will be like, I am just starting to design it. The
main idea is to have a plateu for discussion and a home for every Neenster.
These will be separated by an empty space. As a schematic starting point it
will like the entrance to World++, but of course there will be one crucial
element that makes it Neen.

Do you feel like a virtual scenographer ?
No. Architecture includes scenography anyway, its just more.

What do you think about the concept of " event " in architecture ?
I prefer buildings without people.

Have you ever worked before on stage or performances ?
Yes, a long time a go I used to do the sets for the art-techno band called
Stereo Nova, and recently I did Pause space in Stockholms' Fargfabriken,
where the photographer Jean-Pierre Khazem staged performances with models.

What is your next project ?

Right now I'm working on developing + updating the brand identity + new
space / shop of Forever Laser Institut in Geneva, designing a travelling
museum retrospective of a well known artist, a renovation of a house in Long
Island city and a playground- landscape in a school in Armenia.

Andreas angelidakis