Mural of murdered rapper Killah P. Photo by Natalie Nagorski
By Anna Wolcke
This post has been updated
EXARCHIA — Parts of the original compound of the National Technical University of Athens, one of Greece’s oldest and most prestigious institutions, are in shambles.
Polytech Athens, as it is called by Athenians, in some places is missing some common features of a university. No chairs. No tables. Few professors or students.
Instead there are empty classrooms. Burn marks. Graffiti on inner and outer walls, on staircases, doors and ceilings. “Let’s do some ‘we shouldn’t be doing this’ things,” reads graffiti in a staircase. “Kill cops,” reads another. “Be wild not correctly” (sic.) reads a third.
What used to be one of Greece’s well-preserved historic buildings has in some places become run-down. Established in the late 19th Century, the university became the site of massive demonstrations in 1973, when students started protesting the dictatorship known as the Greek Military Junta.
In November of that year, violence between protesters and the military escalated, starting with a tank entering university grounds, and ending with 40 civilians dead. The riots marked the beginnings of the end of the dictatorship, which fell a year later.
The unrest also gave rise to an anarchist community that has been prominent in the surrounding neighborhood since. Many slogans sprayed on the walls speak to anarchist values; graffiti condemning Fascists and Nazis adorns many staircases.
In 2008, the university became a battleground once again when students protested the death of 15-year old Alexis Grigoropoulos, who was shot and killed by police.
Mural in Exarchia. Photo by Natalie Nagorski
Today, most schools have moved to other locations in Athens. One ground-floor classroom has been turned into a climbing wall. and squatters have moved into some former academic buildings. In the courtyard at the center of campus, white marks on the ground delineate a makeshift soccer field.
Rumor has it that these were drawn by a family that has moved into the basement of one of the buildings, said Vasilia Costa, an architecture student in her fourth year at Polytech Athens.
Only the architecture school is left on a campus that is no longer controlled by the state. At the moment, it is exams period, and architecture students can be found working on projects in rooms across the compound.
Anti-fascist graffiti at Polytech Athens. Photo by Natalie Nagorski.
While most of the buildings are accessible to the public, study rooms can only be entered with a key, keeping strangers out.
And there are a lot of those. The graffiti suggests that not only Athenians come and leave their mark on the walls. Turkish and Arabic graffiti can be found adjacent to Greek slogans. A scrawl in German proclaims, “Wer verrät uns nie? Die Anarchie!“ – Who never betrays us? Anarchie!
The graffiti has become of historic importance itself, a reminder of the past riots.
One former academic building is covered in a huge mural, with the title “#Justice for Zak/Zackie#.” Another mural depicts the rapper Killah P, who was allegedly killed by a supporter of the far-right political party Golden Dawn in 2013. His mural is accompanied by the words “RIP Killah-P.”
This post has been updated to correct the description of a mural.
