Sunday 23 September 2012

Gallery Visits Cyprus 2012 (Part 2)

I also visited the ''Evagoras and Kathleen Lanitis Centre'' at the Carobmill in the Old Castle area in Limassol. The exhibition was called ''Nautilus Cyprus 2012''. There are usually group exhibitions there from time to time. I like to keep myself updated on whenever there is a new one and do my best to go when I can. There was range of different artists and a variety of works. Starting from drawing and painting, all the way to installation and film. I took some photos of the works I found interesting.
Since there were no other exhibitions taking place I visited other galleries that had a paintings for sale, and some that had permanent exhibitions. These included Peter's, Rouan and Zacharias Gallery. I took some photographs of the works that were of interest to me. This first one in particular reminded me of Jenny Saville's work, due to the rich colour and apparent brushstrokes. The second and third reminded me of Marlene Dumas's work. I find they are very mysterious and ghost-like, due to the faint, faded faces, and grey tones. The fourth and fifth are works of Savvas Georgiades, another famous Greek painter whose work was in the National Portrait Gallery. He focuses on people and the face. He has a series of works where he distorts and warps the image before he starts working on canvas. He also uses thick layers of paint and a lot of trial and error.

Gallery Visits Cyprus 2012 (Part 1)

There weren't many exhibitions going on this summer in Cyprus, but I took advantage of what was available. The first exhibition I went to was a group exhibition of my two friends from my foundation course. It was held at the ''House of Education and Art''(Στέγη Γπαμμάτων και Τεχνών). It was nice to see the girls' development a year after university. They both have very different styles and there was a variety of themes, ranging from nature, portraiture, figurative, to still life. Here are some of Penelope Neophytou and Irene Fani's work. The first two belong to Penelope and the other two belong to Irene. Another friend of mine, Felicia Sonnet, also exhibited this year at Antithesis Art and Coffee shop. I didn't manage to take any photos, but more information on her work can be found here: http://www.antithesiscoffeeshop.blogspot.com/. Her work was quite abstract and not usually the style of art I look into but the paintings were well made and very professional-looking.
These girls inspired me to want to make an exhibition next year even more and have made me believe that with hard work and determination anything can be achieved.
Another exhibition I visited was the one of the Greek artist, Sotiris Sorogas at ''Morfi Gallery''. The exhibition was entitled ''Rust and Stones''. His main subjects are stones, misshapen pieces of wood and rusted metal sheets. The materials he usually uses to paint are acrylics, charcoal and ink. He has been in the art world for over 40 years and has also published theoretical texts in books. I find his work to be very poetic and sensitive. I particularly liked his work on stones. His backgrounds are plain and simple, giving emphasis to the stones.
He focuses mainly on light and shadow, giving less attention to colour, adding only a small red cloth, breaking the monotony of grey tones. The paintings were framed in plexi-glass boxes, which I found to be very effective. It almost looked like they were in a museum, giving the impression that they are sacred and are not to be touched. I would like to try out using this technique in my own work sometime. It is simple yet has a lot of texture.