Women Mind the Water Podcast Series: Dimitra Skandali, California/Greece

Submitted as part of the Women Mind the Water (WMW) digital stories project produced by Pam Ferris-Olson, in conjunction with Stories from Main Street and the traveling exhibition "Water/Ways." This story is one in a series created for a podcast in 2022-23, featuring regional and international artists whose inspiration blends conversation, activism, science, and water. Find earlier stories from the WMW initiative by searching for "Women Mind the Water" on this website.

Dimitra Skandali grew up on Paros, a Greek island in the Aegean Sea. She says the island has shaped the way she sees the world. Dimitra combines traditional fiber arts like crochet, embroidery, and weaving with sea grasses and beach trash as a way to focus attention on the ocean and the environmental issues that impact its health and sustainability. While her work is rooted in her relationship with the Aegean Sea, Dimitra also has ties to the Pacific Ocean, having spent almost a decade in California.

Pam Ferris-Olson (00:01): Today, on the Women Mind the Water Artivist Series I'm speaking with Dimitra Skandali. Dimitra grew up on Paros, a Greek island in the Aegean Sea. She says the island has shaped the way she sees the world. Dimitra combined traditional fiber arts like crochet, embroidery, and weaving with seagrasses and beach trash as a way to focus attention on the ocean and the environmental issues it impacts its health and stability.

(00:31): The Women Mind the Water Artivist Series podcast on womenmindthewater.com engages artists in conversation about their work and explores her connection with the ocean. Through their stories Women Mind the Water hopes to inspire and encourage action to protect the ocean and her creatures. My guest on the Women Mind the Water Artivist Series podcast is the Dimitra Skandali, an artist from the Greek island of Paros.

(00:59): While her work is rooted in her relationship with the Aegean Sea, Dimitra also has ties to the Pacific Ocean, having spent almost a decade in California. By using beach trash and other natural materials she explores sustainability and other environmental issues like ocean pollution. Her installations, which have been curated in more than 90 solo and group exhibitions worldwide, allude to increasing environmental risks alongside human migrations and struggles with identity. Welcome Dimitra.

(01:36): In preparation for this podcast I took a virtual tour of Paros and saw that your island home is surrounded by crystal-blue waters, edged by sandy beaches and white rocks. Its towns are lined with cobblestones and whitewashed buildings. It's picture-postcard beautiful. Dimitra, let's begin by having you give us a brief description of the Paros you know. Take us on a virtual trip of the coastline.

Dimitra Skandali (02:07): Hello, Pam. Thank you so much for having me here. It's a big honor to be here and present my work, and share it with your community and the people around the world. I'm truly honored. Well, you got it. Paros is like a cardpost, like all the islands in the Aegean Sea. I grew up here. The island is very small. You can go around it in one hour by car. There are eight villages around the island.

(02:48): Most of them are close to the coast. The seaside, the beaches, and the coast is like you described, clear crystal water, turquoise water, with sandy or rocky beaches. In general, the landscape is dry. But what strikes you is this white and blue. With white and blue, I mean with the buildings, the white buildings, but also the blue water with the sky and all the variations of blue is something really beautiful.

Pam Ferris-Olson (03:32): So, when did you begin to notice the unnatural things that washed ashore? Was it a gradual awakening or was there some event that first grabbed your attention?

Dimitra Skandali (03:42): No, there was not something very specific. In general, especially on the island, the northern beaches gathered mostly plastic and trash because we have strong North winds. So in these beaches you could find anything you can imagine. I was very attracted to this side and searching for treasures.

(04:16): I was calling them always treasures and I spent lots of time collecting. Yeah, it was not one-time thing. It was always. But not something that was ... It was not overwhelming. It was not something that struck me. It was something that was attracting me all the time because [inaudible 00:04:48]-

Pam Ferris-Olson (04:50): So, at what point did you realize that the unnatural things were causing problems for Paros? Was there a direct impact on you or people around you?

Dimitra Skandali (05:00): No. No, it was not that striking, as I said. It was not something that influenced, because we were always sensitive to how to keep the beaches clean. So for example, there were always initiatives with schools, or separate groups with environmental sensitivities, or even just a couple of friends going around and collecting anything you can find.

(05:37): So it was not something that struck me. What struck me really was when I did travels in places like in Central America or in Southeast Asia where I saw the plastic being everywhere and with no empty spot to put your feet, that was for me a moment where I realized how big the problem is. Over here you cannot really experience that overwhelming.

Pam Ferris-Olson (06:21): So in leading up to talking about your art, I was interested to learn that seagrass is the only flowering plant to grow in marine environments. Seagrass I learned evolved from terrestrial plants that recolonized the ocean 70 to 100 million years ago. Like other flowering plants seagrasses are characterized by having roots, and stems, and leaves, and they also form tiny flowers, fruits, and seeds. Seagrass meadows are some of the most productive ecosystems in the world. Once out of water however, the seagrass dries and becomes brittle. So how is it that you have chosen to work with such a fragile material, and how do you manipulate it?

Dimitra Skandali (07:04): For me, it was a symbolism of the ocean. And when I was far away from home, when I was in California for almost 10 years as you mentioned, it felt to me what connected me with the island. So being close to the ocean and spending hours collecting it, and knotting it together, and spending time with friends also collecting it and doing the work sometimes together, it felt to me that it brought me closer to home.

Pam Ferris-Olson (07:44): I think what you do is unique. I haven't come across anybody else that works with seagrass. I know here in Maine I see people go to the beach and rake up the seagrass and use it as fertilizer on their beds. But because it's so brittle, it's not something that you intuitively think of as working with. So I wondered, would you describe the creations you make from seagrass like being sandcastles and just temporary creations? Are they meant to withstand the passage of time?

Dimitra Skandali (08:18): Yes, you are very right. That's how I see them. They are so fragile and even when I am working with it, it constantly breaks, and I go back and I knot it again, and I continue again and again to do the same thing. And if I have to install and reinstall the same piece, it's like I'm doing it from the beginning because it breaks all the time. So yes, it has the symbolism of our ephemerality and how sensitive our balances are between humans and nature. It is like a bell reminding us the circle of life and our responsibility of our presence. It gave me the opportunity to use it as a language and to go and to read it with the tradition that I knew.

Pam Ferris-Olson (09:30):

So how different are the beaches in Northern California from the ones in Paros? What's the most striking difference?

Dimitra Skandali (09:40): Ooh, there is no comparison I think. Oh my god, it was a big surprise to when I first saw the Pacific Ocean, this vastness of it. I was in San Francisco because I studied in San Francisco Art Institute. And the feeling that the next land is Japan, for example, from the United States, it was incredibly shocking the vastness of the ocean.

Pam Ferris-Olson (10:15): Right. It's a very wild coast definitely compared to what you're telling me the Aegean looks like.

Dimitra Skandali (10:21): This is what I wanted to say from sharks, to currents, to really huge pollution, very big pollution in parts.

Pam Ferris-Olson (10:31): So has being in Northern California and seeing the wild Pacific Ocean, which is not blue, full of waves, and definitely they have great blue sharks, I too lived in that area for 10 years, has that changed or affected your artistic expression?

Dimitra Skandali (10:52): Definitely. Of course. First of all, this is the place where I first saw this material. In the Mediterranean we have a completely different seaweed. We have the posidonia oceanica which is even more fragile. I could never use it to do what I'm doing with the seagrass from the Pacific, which is called Zostera marina. I weave them together, and this is what I'm talking about the dialogue between here and there.

(11:29): But also to show the universality, and how we are all connected, and how we are all interdependent. So this was also something that changed in my philosophy, in that practice when I was in California. How everything is connected, and no matter where we are, we are connected with the same issues. Symbolically, I am using these two elements together with the trash that I collect from both places, but also from my travels around the world. I always collect everything from everywhere, even bits.

Pam Ferris-Olson (12:09): Well, how do you bring seagrass back from California?

Dimitra Skandali (12:13): In a plastic bag. You don't need too much, and I try to bring as much as I can in my suitcase, and-

Pam Ferris-Olson (12:31): Do you get strange looks when you come through?

Dimitra Skandali (12:35): Well, I see always my suitcase is open, which is, you know it's fat. But it is like a grass.

Pam Ferris-Olson (12:45): Right. So talk to me about the process of combining natural and waste products in your art. How do you choose the mix? Do you view them as hard and soft or some other counterpoint?

Dimitra Skandali (12:57): Actually, I'm using them both to show the sensitive balances between the natural and the manmade.

Pam Ferris-Olson (13:08): So what sort of things do you find on the beaches in your hometown or in the Aegean that you weave in?

Dimitra Skandali (13:18): I usually collect plastic threads. Plastic ropes that they use for the boats. But they are all washed out at the beaches, as you understood I guess of course everybody. And also pieces or whole pieces of fishing nets, plastic fishing nets, or the whole fishing nets if I find. Then I combine it with the ones that I crochet or make with the seaweed. Also, plastic bags, because I use the plastic bags as a surface and I draw, usually I play with maps a lot.

(14:06): I am inspired by maps. And I make embroideries on the plastic bags. So yeah, these are ... And also little pieces of wood. But especially here on the island, because we find the little pieces of, like that for example, of wood that it was part of the wooden fishing boats which are unfortunately less and less. Anyway, so pieces like that I am attracted to them.

Pam Ferris-Olson (14:54): Let's talk about one of the pieces that's really impactful to you, and then you can send me a picture of it. What should we talk about?

Dimitra Skandali (15:03): What should I choose? I guess there are many that are my favorite. But I could talk about this dress that I sent you the photograph. That's made with nets that I crocheted with seaweed. They were nets made from 2012 until 2015. And then I combined them all together and I made this dress, which I was wearing it, and I did a performance for four hours, non-stop crocheting.

(15:43): But it was the first piece that I also used the plastic threads. So in general I was by myself and my elements, but I had a window open for half an hour at the opening where I invited the people to give me pieces of seaweed and plastic threads. So that was a beautiful I think piece to interact also with the audience.

Pam Ferris-Olson (16:18): Finally, Dimitra, as an artist with a wide lens to the problems of the ocean, I wonder if you have a singular call to action. What message would you like to leave the audience with?

Dimitra Skandali (16:32): I will not say something that you don't already know. Just to be mindful. Just be aware of we are just passage by. We need to be responsible, we are responsible for everything that is happening on the Earth. It's not somebody else who is making this mess. It's us, and we need to realize that. No matter where we come from or where we stand, even a little bit matters, and we have to realize that because the future generations are coming. I mean we have to be more careful. It's not endless what the Earth gives us. It's not endless. It has limits, so we have to realize our responsibility.

Pam Ferris-Olson (17:24): Okay. Thank you, Dimitra, for being on the Women Mind the Water Artivist Series podcast. I hope that listeners have gained an appreciation for the fragility of natural resources such as seagrass and the power of the artist to transform seemingly inconsequential things into powerful statements. I'd like to remind listeners that I've been speaking with Dimitra Skandali, an artist from the Greek Island of Paros, for the Women Mind the Water Artivist Series podcast.

(17:56): The series can be viewed on womenmindthewater.com, Museum on Main Street, and YouTube. An audio-only version of this podcast is available on womenmindthewater.com, on iTunes, and Spotify. Women Mind The Water is grateful to Jane Rice for the use of her song, Women of Water. All rights for the Women Mind the Water name and logo belong to Pam Ferris-Olson. This is Pam Ferris-Olson.

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Asset ID: 2023.01.01.a-b
Themes: Ocean, Pollution, Trash, Greece, Beaches, Travel, Plastics, Plastic Bags, Sustainability, Sea grass, Ecosystems, Fiber Arts, Crochet, Weaving, Cycle of Life, Balance, Pacific Ocean, Mediterranean Sea, Fishing Nets, Clothing, Textiles
Date recorded: December 9, 2022
Length of recording: 0:18:25
Related traveling exhibition: Water/Ways
Sponsor or affiliated organization: Women Mind the Water
More information: https://womenmindthewater.com/featured-guests