Modern Mythologies

Christos Bokoros presents a unique ode to time, memory, philosophy, and poetics. Flames adopt a metonymic role, simultaneously generating  a mnemonic rather than natural tone. Painted upon wood, he subtly hints at the aesthetics of Byzantine Iconoclasm.

The use of reclaimed wooden planks is not only a transformative practice, lending ritual status to the everyday, but one which preserves the marks of time. The materiality of the surface and image interact in a dialectic exchange which challenges the urge of mimetic imperative.

Reaffirming the spirit of 'greekness', Kostas Papanikolaou represents a resistance to the current of postmodernism in Greece. Using the medium of egg tempera on wood, he reflects the warmth and vitality of the natural world, and aligns with an antique painterly tradition.

'The Funeral' depicts a panoramic view of the circle of life. The symbolic olive tree, with its glittering foliage, dominates the left of the composition. Snapshots of joy are juxtaposed with an atmosphere of grief - lending the scene an indirect air of spirituality.

The painter writes life ('zographos'); Stefanos Daskalakis is no exception. Working directly with models for a period of up to two months, he forms a relationship with the subject in a process which pauses and solidifies their exchange; an ontology of the present.

He sculpts each figure through a series of gestural brushstrokes. As such, new age models metamorphose into contemporary monuments, in a poetic practice which lends the weight of the eternal to the everyday.

Leda Contogiannopoulou approaches painting as narration. People and their environments communicate with her on an emotional level, existing in dialogue within her works and contributing to a more complete character portrait. 

Her love for the material nature of interiors is evident in her 'Self-Portrait', with the textile backdrop playing a vital compositional function.

Though figurative, Alecos Levidis challenges a mimetic mode of aesthetic production by visibly disrupting the normally seamless surface of reality. Juxtaposing seemingly contrasting narrative elements and allusions, he maintains syntax through the preservation of scale.

Three female forms - the ideal of beauty - draw us into 'Agora' and articulate an antithesis with the three male statues, partially obscured on the left of the scene. Together, they stand as testimonies to antiquity, brutally contrasted by the present climate of decay.

Emmanouil Bitsakis presents a similarly 'collaged aesthetic'. Familiar images are warped and transposed into a surrealist realm, magically uniting past and present and constructing a contemporary mythology.

The assembling of subjects from various registers and sources challenges traditional notions of hierarchy in a process which treats each fragment without discrimination. Here, the juxtaposition of the ecclesiastical with the mythical, lends humor to the scene.