ICE Board Chair Andreas Waldburg-Wolfegg in conversation with Madame Françoise Xenakis, widow of Iannis Xenakis. Andreas and Françoise met in March, 2009 in Paris at the same apartment where she and Iannis had lived for nearly fifty years, until his death in 2001. Stay tuned for portions of the audio recording of this interview in ICE’s podcast series: Tracing Xenakis.
Part I
Madame Xenakis tells the story of how she met Iannis, and speaks about his experience in the Second World War and his upbringing.
Mme Xenakis: Oh, I can tell you the story, it’s very strange. It was in 1950, in winter, you’ve got to understand that because your mother made you learn French and now, etc. My mother was schoolteacher and was remarkable with children, who obeyed her, and they became firemen, teachers, two of them were graduates of the ENA [Ecole nationale d’administration], etc, and me, it didn’t work on. I refused to take her orders. I refused. I ran away, yes, yes. And so she decided that I was a fool and needed to go to a trade school to learn how to make brassieres.
So finally she made me take an examination in order to be a seamstress at 17 years old. I flunked high school, I got myself expelled…I just didn’t want to do it. [read more]
