Communitism reclaims unutilised heritage buildings of Athens to be revived through creative commoning. By practising community and art, alternatives to existing structures emerge.
Communitism has been working consistently since 2015 to apply a simple but elegantly synergistic solution to address the critical issues affecting the city: We are an open community of creative professionals such as artists, cultural managers, architects and restoration engineers who negotiate the occupation and use of abandoned heritage properties to house creative professionals and communities for little or no rent, in return for them using their presence, skills, energy and enthusiasm to preserve and restore the heritage buildings through a process of creative commoning. We explore practices of commoning in a space that functions as an open lab, with communities and users of the building developing symbiotic relationships with one another, as they test and develop new practices on an ongoing basis. We began as -and continue to be- a learning organisation.
During our six-year stay at 28 Kerameikou Street, we opened the doors of a 1.200 sq.m. neoclassical building to a diverse community of artists, cultural professionals, passionate up/recyclers, and neighbourhood communities. Communitism was forced to leave 28 Kerameikou due to property sale, but our vision remains, as it responds dynamically and precisely to an urgent need: as the city is transformed by touristification and gentrification, residents are losing access to spaces vital for artistic and social expression. Sustaining this turmoil, our organisation, now housed in our temporary offices in Votanikos, is implementing our new strategic framework, working to secure collective community ownership of a permanent home for our activities in the centre of the city – a neoclassical building owned in trust for the people of Athens and accessible to all in perpetuity.