The Equilibrists of Memory

The "The Equilibrists of Memory" app is a free application that uses augmented reality, allowing viewers to experience Kalos&Klio's artwork on a deeper level. "The Equilibrists of Memory" (2018) is a series of twelve digitally edited photo portraits featuring an AR app, audio video, lines from the poem "Home" by British-Somali poet Warsan Shire, and archival material to create a political allegory about the forced displacement of refugees and migrants, fleeing war, violence, and persecution in the Middle East, Asia, and Africa, to cross the Mediterranean, one of the most hazardous routes to Greece and the EU. The portraits depict black-veiled figures balancing on their heads, a totemic assemblage of clothing, rugs, war artillery, sculptures, relics, and books, symbolizing a culture's memory, identity, belonging, and homeland—the wreckage of humanity that arises as a new monument.