Jasin Challah debuted in the comedy show Das Arbeitstier on Sat 1 and he continues to experiment with various comedy formats for television channels and production companies. He co-founded the production company Puppetempire.com and he developed and produced various puppet-comedy series. His Kosta Rapadopoulos puppet, a hilarious, penniless yet disarmingly goodhearted Greek gastarbeiter, has late-night TV show and appears on YouTube clips philosophizing on Greek lifestyle, history, and contemporary politics. In his 2010 film Kamakia – The heroes of the island, Rapadopoulos interviews 1970s "Greek lovers" chasing female tourists on Greek islands, celebrating and cannibalizing the Zorba-type conception of the modern Greek. Kosta Rapadopoulos is an uncanny overidentification with a typical semi-folk identity representing unresolved intercultural objectifications and fantasies. How is the "Greek identity" reproduced internationally? What is the imprint of the recent crisis in bilateral representations of the other? Rapadopoulos performs in the space GiGi: a Product of German-Greek Love, presents interviews, and analyzes his own work.

#greeklover #kamakia #comedy #semi-folk #lifestyle #overidentification

photos: Nysos Vasilopoulos, 6th Athens Biennale 2018 ANTI