Written by Nina Pappa

The “The Lost Text” is an interactive video walk, about the research and the study of inscriptions. Epigraphists regard inscriptions as the absolute historical objects, because unlike other historical texts, in the case of inscriptions there are no scribes or correctors to intervene; only the wear caused by time.

The epigrafists examine the texts as material surfaces, where even damages might be potential parts of the text.

Their study requires the incorporation of different texts, their notebooks include incomplete letters of worn inscriptions, handwritten notes with hypothetical readings, pieces of squeezes and drawings imitating ancient texts, in which even the breaks of a stone are attributed.

The matter forms an intermediate delivery (word), a text between the human writing and the random events, which requires the conception of any interpretive possibility.

Deciphering erased texts on worned stones, is often turned into an ecstatic process that requires suited personalities to be completed.

The visitor will walk through the museum, watch interviews with epigraphists who recount their experiences and will be acquainted with the faces behind the worn out exhibits.

The video walk is based on the practice of site-specific visual interventions and the tradition of documentary film.