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W
e start off our quarterly issue of Cyprus Today with a truly remarkable effort by the
Cyprus National Commission for UNESCO, and Cultural Services of the Ministry of
Education and Culture, to preserve our beautiful island’s oral customs and traditions – with
the invaluable contribution of the people still keeping these elements alive. An impressive
eight new Cypriot elements have been inscribed on UNESCO’s Representative List of the
Intangible Cultural Heritage of Humanity, bringing our total up to eleven.
Read on to find out just what it takes to get an element on the List, as well as details of our
national treasures, including the dry stone technique, basketry from the Livadia community
and Tsattista poetic duelling. And to prove how all the work is paying off, take a look at
how well UNESCO’s training programme for Lefkaritiko embroidery lace turned out.
It was that time of year again for our authors and illustrators, as the State Prizes for
Literature rolled around in December to provide some well-earned recognition for their
work. Speaking of recognition, it has been 100 years since the birth of the great Greek
Cypriot writer, and poet, Kypros Chrysanthis, and the Council of Ministers has dedicated
the year 2015 to him. Readers can find out how the Society of Cypriot Studies decided to
honour him in this issue of Cyprus Today.
And for our art lovers, we have art exhibitions by Zenon Sierepeklis, George Kotsonis and
Constantinos Ptohopoulos, as well as an exhibition of relics from the EOKA Struggle to
commemorate 60 years since the struggle began.
Cinema lovers got to enjoy an array of the best local and national short film offerings in
the 5
th
International Short Film Festival of Cyprus, with over one hundred short fiction,
documentary, experimental and animated films from across the world receiving prizes in
recognition of their contribution.
Our current issue also takes a look at the celebrations marking 25 years of excavations
conducted by members of the academic, interdepartmental Athienou Archaeological
Project at the archaeological site of Malloura. The AAP is credited with rearing generations
of young archaeologists, who have taken up important positions in universities and bodies
abroad, promoting Cypriot archaeology to the world scientific community.
And this year’s annual Nemitsas Foundation Prize was a bit closer to our hearts, as it
was dedicated to Visual Arts. Artist Christodoulos Panayiotou, internationally recognised
for his wide-ranging achievements in Visual Arts, and specifically the identification and
uncovering of hidden narratives in visual records of time, was this year’s winner.
This and much more on our island’s cultural life in this edition of Cyprus Today!
Editorial
