Dear friends,
Five prominent Greek ceramicists will be presenting their work on the island of Paxos for the first time this summer in the exhibition Five Greek Ceramicists in Paxos:
Ilias Hristopoulos
Angelika Kogevina
Giannis Mamoutzis
Haris Panousopoulos
Giorgios Vavatsis
The ceramic exhibition will be accompannied by the latest series of photography on glass – After Empire – by Vivian van Blerk, our resident photographer for the summer of 2016, and oil paintings with classical themes by the Genoa painter Nicola Villa . Please see a selection of Vivian’s photos after the ceramics below.
Though Greece is famous for its production of beautifully fashioned and painted ceramics in antiquity, Greek contemporary creators are far less known by the general public.
In the last 15 years ceramics have occupied an increasingly important place in contemporary creation across the Western world. As institutional art itself has increasingly turned to video, installation and concept-based production, ceramic creation has instead focused on the re-invention of the beautiful object and the elaboration of increasingly sophisticated and original sculptural and glazing techniques.
In the current exhibition we aim to show the variety of technique and styles that exist in contemporary Greek ceramics. Each of our artists brings to his work a distinctive personality expressed by shape, volume, color and the sculptural nature of most of the objects. The result is a set of ceramics that are expressive rather than just decorative, and that establish a dynamic dialogue with each other and the spaces of the exhibition.
The exhibition will be accompanied by a slide lecture on contemporary Greek ceramics and a projection of a documentary on traditional Messenian jars from the Peloponnese, a lecture by Angelika Kogevina on how to decode ancient Greek vases and two workshops for adults and children on making ceramics by Ilias Hristopoulos and Angelika Kogevina (see dates and times below). The workshop oven in Loggos for the firing of the ceramics will remain on the island and has been offered to the Paxos municipality by Chris Boïcos Fine Arts, Angelika Kogevina and Dimitri Anastopoulos.
