AIM Athens 2014 was at Art-Athina in the Taekwondo Stadium, Athens, with thirteen participants from nine partner organisations. For the second year Art-Athina ran ‘Platforms Project @ Art-Athina’ (a section for artist-run spaces and artists’ groups) and AIM were invited to participate in their seminar program. A discussion moderated by George Oreopoulos and Delia Potaminaou from the radio station Βeton7ArtRadio opened the conference. They hosted a group interview, a model commonly used in the radio programme Art Therapy, using questions that often arise within an artist-run initiative, such as how the membership is composed, what is easy or difficult with the cooperation and collaboration, if non-profit work is (unavoidably) exhausting, if their own artist practice come in conflict with – or is inspired by – the non-profit work. It also examined projects, as inspiration and formal ways of operating that lead to the selection of certain types of art, curatorial practices, funding and sharing of resources, and the relationship of artist-run initiatives to the commercial and institutional art world.
Local artist initiatives Salon de Vortex, Lo and Behold, and Filopappou Group were invited to present their projects, which was preceded by short introductions from the partner organisations. Subsequent discussion revolved around how activities affect the availability and sustainability of premises. The conference included a regular working meeting for the network partners where the pilot version of the database was shown and where data collection and the map function were developed further.