Builders, Housewives and the Construction of Modern Athens

The internationally awarded and globally screened film by Tasos Langis and Yiannis Gaitanidis, produced by the Onassis Stegi, returns to its home and is now available on Stegi’s channel with Audio Description by liminal.

An aged hand holds a small black-and-white photograph. In it, three young construction workers in overalls smile as they pose in front of half-plastered walls.

A few words about “Builders…”

Who were those people from the countryside who came to Athens with their wives after the Civil War and “cemented” the city? Who “demolished” the neoclassical buildings and why did they fill the Attica Basin with apartment buildings? How did they learn and develop their craft, where did they come from, what techniques and knowledge did they carry with them? How did they reinvent their tools to satisfy emerging needs? How did they communicate and negotiate with the “educated” architects? What were their wives asking for? In other words, what was the story of their encounter with the “project of modernity”? As long as these “co-authors” remain invisible, the history of modern Athens is still incomplete, if not also deeply deceptive. This documentary is based on the same-titled book by Ioanna Theocharopoulou, revised and published in 2022 by the Onassis Foundation.

Directors’ Note:

In a living-dining room with old-fashioned yet well-kept furniture, an elderly couple sits at opposite ends of the table, gazing toward the camera. The woman, with black hair, wearing a white cardigan and a long black skirt, has her hands clasped in her lap. Across from her, the man—his white hair and mustache framing his face—rests his elbow on the table beside him, leaning his head into his hand.

“Athens is our city—where we were born, where we live, and which we love as if it were ‘our village.’ Yet it is contradictory and almost unknown, its repetitive fabric of apartment buildings sprawling around us, unsettling. A space like an impenetrable text, illegible in its generality, devoid of clear historical references beyond the landmark of the Acropolis and a few scattered, disconnected monuments. ‘How was all this built?’ one wonders. Certainly not by architects and urban planners. Inspired by Ioanna Theocharopoulou’s book, we searched the cracks of our modern urban History to uncover those internal migrant co-creators of our built environment. We began with the same preconceptions: that they ‘destroyed Athens,’ that it was ‘Karamanlis’s antiparochi [land-exchange system],’ and so on. We don’t know if these biases and myths about Athens will ever fade. Only that now, another story has been added—about the making of Europe’s oldest new capital.“

Following its international awards, the film is now available with AD

After its premiere in the Official Competition section of Athens International Film Festival “Opening Nights” in September 2021 and its participation in the IRIS Awards competition, the “builders and housewives” of Athens crossed the Atlantic, winning the Best Film Award at Cinema Urbana – Architecture Film Festival Brasilia in August 2022. Continuing its successful festival run in New York, Toronto, Vancouver, Washington D.C., Chicago, Chile, and Rotterdam, the film now makes a stop in Athens, available for streaming on the Onassis Stegi’s digital platform – where it is also presented with Audio Description by liminal.

Watch the film audio described here:

Συντελεστές προσβασιμότητας

Script: Alexandra Georgovasili, Maria Thrasyvoulidi Editing & Narration: Maria Thrasyvoulidi Quality Control: Yiannis Vitsos Recording Studio: Basement Productions Audio Description Recording & Mixing: Io Chalda

Do you want more?

Watch now via this link the fascinating discussion held at the Small Stage of the Onassis Stegi, as part of the Greek launch of Ioanna Theocharopoulou’s book “Builders, Housewives, and the Construction of Modern Athens” (Onassis Foundation Publications, 2022), with author Ioanna Theocharopoulou, the filmmakers Tasos Langis and Yiannis Gaitanidis, the Onassis Foundation’s Director of Culture Aphrodite Panagiotakou, architect and film advisor Panos Dragonas, and anthropologist Michael Herzfeld, who also served as the documentary’s narrator.

Film still from "Builders, Housewives...". A black-and-white aerial shot of the Athens basin. White curved lines, drawn like arcs, hover over select apartment buildings, visually connecting them. Small red annotations above the buildings and beside the arches mark the structures' heights, which in this frame range from 18.40 to 22.50 meters.

A few words about the directors

Tasos Langis

Tasos Langis studied film at Long Island University in New York and at Stavrakos Film School in Athens. In 2008, he participated in the Berlinale Talent Campus in Berlin. His research focuses on symbiotic forms of storytelling across different media. Currently, he is preparing another documentary about Athens, this time exploring the question of how we can inhabit the city today.

Yiannis Gaitanidis

Yiannis Gaitanidis was born in Athens. A graduate of the Directing Department at Stavrakos Film School, he has directed short films, TV documentary series, and videos for theater productions and museums. His work has been screened and awarded at festivals in Greece and abroad (Best Short Film Orpheus Award – 2nd Los Angeles Greek Film Festival; Special Jury Mention – Sarajevo Film Festival; Kassel DocFest, among others). He is currently finishing the edit of an independent documentary and developing the script for his first feature-length film.