Without Baggage

GREAT news - great nudes

I would never have known from the invitation card which was a well painted splodge-dot in the midst of seemingly heavily applied pigment that the main and major works in Maria Koudouna’s Aego exhibition, Choris Aposkeves or Without Baggage, were superb, richly-painted (some in oil) nudes in gorgeous colour.

Underneath the seeming flurry of brushwork there was the strength of excellent drawing ability. Argo is aglow with the love of humanity in all its warmth and visual glory.

Until March 7.

Penelope Constantinou

This exhibition at Gloria’s was covered well last week.

And, it’s welcome back Penelope, with the packed opening proving her number of followers. For me, it was her outstanding gift of use of spatial values which dominated the show.

Remarkable.

Constantinos Stefanou

This Apocalypse exhibition has already had remarkable praise in this newspaper.

Maybe because of my own history with oldies such as Diamantis and Savva, I did not warm to it very much.

However, the artist appears to be very popular and certainly has a lot to say.

Mixed at Peter’s

Tucked away between Apocalypse and Gloria’s is the Nicosia Peter’s Gallery, the other being in Limassol.

The work here can be quite variable.

The last time I popped in, there was some excellent sculpture by an artist who had made some marvellous forms in stone.

Her standard was very high.

This time the place was flooded with all kinds of work; mostly mediocre. However, there is one outstanding work amongst the paintings.

It is by Peter himself.

Why not have a one-man show, Peter?

Mill grinds exceedingly slow

AT the time of this page going to bed the Great Mill Show in Kaimakli was not ready.

Panayitois Meraclis and Hercules have been working very hard and the show will be great I’m sure. It is in Kaimakli, of course, with a baker’s dozen of Kaimaklisian entries.

One excellent artist participating also has her own personal show at The Centre of Contemporary Art, Diatapos, which is in Crete Street.

This is Kyriaki Costa and it opens on March 4.

Entitled Presence in Absence, it is superb.

Kyriaki also has her own shop in Phaneromeni as well as a top fashion centre in Kaimakli.

Opening time

The Lazaris Argyrou retrospective exhibition will be opened this evening, Friday, February 27, by philologist Costas Hadjigeorghiou at 7.30pm. It will remain open until March 6.

Stass Paraskos

A new book on Stass Paraskos has been printed by Orange Press.

It was been edited by Michael Paraskos with essays by John Cornall, David Haste, Norbert Lynton and Benedict Read.

Stass Paraskos was born in Cyprus into a poor family of shepherds in the village of Anaphotia.

His journey to becoming an artist with work in major collections around the world, including London’s Tate Gallery, is a remarkable one.

As well as being an artist , he is a prolific writer, and has written books, articles and essays on art, history and politics.

For many years, Paraskos taught in Britain, most notably at Leeds College of Art, De Montfort University and the University for the Creative Arts, and he founded the first Art School in Cyprus, the celebrated Cyprus College of Art.

The collection of essays is published to coincide with Paraskos’s 75 birthday, and two major exhibitions of his new paintings at Leeds College of Art and Design and K Gallery.

Benedict Read mentions how the young Giotto was spotted by the eminent senior painter Cimabue.

Cimabue “came upon Giotto who, while his sheep were grazing, was drawing one of them from life with a roughly pointed piece of stone upon a smooth surface of rock, although he had never had any master but Nature.”

Read continues that Stass grew up in rural Cyprus and, as a boy, he tended his uncle’s sheep near the village of Anaphotia. He further mentions how, as a young man, Stass came to England and enrolled at Leeds College of Art and was soon spotted by Thubron, then Head of Painting, who more or less ordered his academic colleagues to leave Stass well alone, as there was already such a unique artistic personality there and he should not be interfered with by humdrum academic formulae.

Norbert Lynton gives an excellent account of the period when Stass’ work was accused of being pornographic and how the great world famous poet Sir Herbert Read went to his defence.

In ‘Stass and Cypriotness,’ John Cornall explains that “although Paraskos is ardently a Cypriot artist, he is not a nationalist. He objects in plain terms to the way the politicians and Church in Cyprus play a nationalistic ticket, distorting history for their own ends.”

David Haste gives a knowledgeable account of Stass’s stay at Canterbury College of Art.

Stass’s son Michael gives a full account of Stass’s Cyprus College of Art and there are many beautiful pages of the great man’s paintings in the book.

Congratulations to everyone.