Loizidou, C. (2014) Commemoration Public Art and Memorial Politics in Cyprus (1901 – 2013) [PhD Thesis]

Abstract:

The thesis uses a number of commemorative works to delve into questions around
spatial politics, memory and its institutionalisation, as well as political communication in
Cyprus, at distinct historical moments in the twentieth century and to this day. It tells the
stories of monuments which, when this project began, all stood a few meters away from
each other in Nicosia, the divided capital of Cyprus. It focuses on Archbishop Kyprianos
Square in Nicosia—the area around the Archiepiscopal Palace of the Christian Orthodox
Church of Cyprus, a location of coinciding ecclesiastical and political power for
centuries—and documents the stories of the area’s memorial installations and the ways in
which they have featured in different types of conflict and debates around representation.
It traces the power struggles inherent in these artworks’ conception, creation and in their
subsequent lives within changing political environments, media-scapes, or, more broadly
speaking, public spheres. Looked at through this lens, these public artworks correspond to
re-articulations of the Cyprus conflict and discourses around its resolution at different
stages. As there is little previous work on Cypriot commemoration and public art, the
thesis addresses gaps in the history of Cypriot art and communication. Beyond the case of
Cyprus, this examination of how particular installations starred in memorial dramas
formative of the island’s subsequent political realities, makes the methodological argument
that the (art) historical study of memorial politics can be a good way to think around issues
of political representation, democracy, and the means through which social and political
consensus is generated. Looking into the present, and beyond traditional forms of
commemoration and memorialisation, this thesis identifies how memorial politics are now
being played out in new ways, in new arenas, and through other kinds of media, and how
they are implicated in broader and broader dynamics of power and control, which have to
be carefully assessed and located.