Lost in Time

Each and every one of these Medieval villages was built in a fortified arrangement, with the outer houses creating the wall of defense which protected the settlement from raids and pillages by pirates. Narrow lanes paved with stone, with many dead ends in order to disorientate would-be invaders, connect the tightly packed one-stoned houses. On the ground floor there are the stables, the storage room for farming tools, wine presses and large pots pushed into the ground for storing olive oil and wine. On the upper floor there was an open-air hall, known as the “pounti” which was used for letting sunlight and air into the rooms. Lastly, the flat roof tops, more or less the same height, created a uniform level so that the terraces could also be used as a passage from one house to the next in case of an emergency. The construction of these houses with thick stones made sure they were cool in the summer and warm in the winter, while the big ovens and fireplaces used for warmth on cold days enabled the inhabitants to cook and make sure they had their daily meal.

These houses in the Mastic Villages are the ones Stratis is photographing and trying to understand their inner world, to catch the soul of the people who lived in them and to get the meaning of their lives up to the moment they abandoned them.

And he is searching to find and convey to us the spirit of the time which has gone by and which is one of the important issues of our time.

Many times, I wondered what Chios means to me, but I had no answers, so I kept on “pushing” my photography-oriented quest as far as possible. I visited untouched beaches and tourist beaches; remote villages and fortress villages, embarked on caiques and entered shipyards, visited sheepfolds and unknown routes. Each route was connected in a strange way with the previous one; without knowing, I followed the paths I already knew. Certainly, in all these routes there were the encounters with my compatriots, the Chians. According to Sytlianos Vios “Chians are all crazy: some fully, some not so much”, and paraphrasing what Aristotle said, no sublime soul is void of touch of craziness. Gifted with a hot temperament, wittiness, high spirits, kindness, humour and simplicity. Chians gave me something precious their very selves, on account of which, I am, frankly, grateful to them.

When my photographic expeditions came to an end and editing started, I realized that I wanted to talk about this Chios that hides itself in its corners a place whose truths one may feel only if one comes quite close to it. My wish and desire is to try to convey with these photographs the sense of what Chios may be like and not to persuade that this is Chios. My anxiety had been from the outset not to beautify this special place, make it appear more “tourist-like”, but to record what I thought was real; what I thought was beautiful; what I thought Chios itself is like.