A blaze of colour
TO get to Pantheon Gallery you go up a dingy lift in an area (Pantheon Cinema nearby) surrounded
by a mess of road repairs and jammed cars.
However, once inside the gallery it is all tidy and calm and - as so often in this particular
gallery - containing wonderful works hung with taste and the understanding of space.
The current artist is Giorgos Achilleos, but the only information I have is that he was born
in 1979 and is from Larnaca.
It appears he studied at Thessaloniki at an art school which has a very good reputation for bringing
out the very best in our Cypriot artists.
After visiting exhibitions by our senior citizens in another part of town, I braved the town’s
threatening pavements, walked to Pantheon and went up the grubby little lift.
The place was a blaze of colour.
Wall-to-wall beauty arranged to perfection.
Some paintings had a sort of flat cubism in the background. In ‘Andria,’ for example,
the image of a woman’s face was surrounded as by a chequered board.
Most of the hair on the woman was obliterated but in one “square” a straggle of hair
could be observed. As this was the end of a length of hair, the effect was spidery, almost eerie.
The main image, however, as in other paintings, was always present.
An all over amount of “squares” transfers the ‘Woman Crawling On Her Hands’
into a dazzle of light without erasing the original image.
Giorgos has a colour sense to rival our painters of previous generations, and that includes Christoforos
Savva too.
Images can have more than one meaning.
“Is that a tear, a drooping petal or merely a trickle of blood?”
Cyprus art continues with strength. Do go to the Pantheon.
The Christmas gallery round
AMONGST the cards with a baby or a Christmas tree on you will still discover:
Stass Paraskos, Stelios Votsis and also Stefos Metaxas have taken the town. All three now at
Opus 39 Gallery and it continues until December 8.
Stass is also at Apocalypse with new naive, while Votsisis is at Argo, with very well-selected
work.
It has been written that Nitsa Hadjigeorghiou and Savros Kikas have new work at d/p Gallery,
Limassol. Should be excellent.
News has just come in that Doros Eracleous will be at Gloria Gallery after the fine Marios Christodoulou
exhibition closes on the second of December.
Doros’ exhibition will open on Thursday, December 4.
Expect amazing things.
While you are visiting the Ladommatos exhibition and book launch at Laiki Bank in Bouboulina
Street, take a long, long look at his paintings of windows.
Brilliant.
Kikos Lanitis’ exhibition goes on at Silks Gallery until the 30th of the month
Sunday (this) is the last day for Andros Efstathiou at Kypriaki Gonia.
Golden Byzantine at Katia’s Treasures, Saturday, November 29, from 6pm-10pm at the studio
on 24A Kennedy Avenue
Irma Voulgari - from December 5-20 - with Microcosms at Pantheon Gallery
Please read Coming Events.
An exhibition of ceramic sculpture and functional objects by Ilias Boudsaniotis is on at Orpheus
Gallery, Limassol until December 31.
The Greek ceramic artist has his second solo show in Cyprus. It is a pleasure to see how he has
evolved since his last exhibition and to see the whimsical, playful figures of his clowns, sometimes holding a single flower
in white gloved hand ready to give to someone, a parrot perched on a shoulder, or both.
Maybe they are just empty handed, yet with welcoming open arms and a big clown-like grin on their
bright red lips. Colourful stripes in the trousers are set against the simplicity of the stoneware that he uses.
They are finished at 700 degrees C on the final firing for the gold/platinum he uses for hats
and edgings.
This show includes a range of functional objects for use in the home, like a cup and saucer -
with the elongated nose acting as the handle to the cup with two eyes starring back at you as you lift it towards your mouth.
Teapots, vases and other created objects, all finished to a high degree, depicting his standards as an award winning young
ceramic artist.
