On a hot summer day, a group of US archeologists are studying the plains of de-industrialised Thebes, the city of Antigone and Oedipus. The camera moves between agriculture, infrastructure and ancient ruins while a field worker is leaving the crops after a day’s labour. The landscape scenes are overlaid with an on-screen poem on Thebes’ polluted soil and its histories of impurity and displacement. Seven Types of Dust celebrated its world premiere at the recent Doclisboa International Film Festival.

Danae Io is an artist and filmmaker based in Athens and Rotterdam. Her practice takes as a focus the ways collective and personal histories are narrativised and consolidated. Her films have been screened at Doclisboa (2024), the Institute of Contemporary Art London (2023) and the International Film Festival Rotterdam (2023), among others. Her work has been exhibited at UKS, Oslo; State of Concept, Athens; and Kunstverein Amsterdam among others.