Katerina Christidi
15 May - 21 Jun 2008
KATERINA CHRISTIDI
"Charcoal Overload!"
Katerina Christidi solo exhibition, titled Charcoal Overload!, is scheduled to open on Thursday, 15th May 2008, at 19:30, at the Ileana Tounta Centre for Contemporary Art.
The exhibition will run until 21th June 2008.
Katerina Christidi presents a new series of large-scale drawings on canvas, created in 2007 and 2008. It is in fact a series of portraits, in which it is hard to determine either the age or sex of the individuals depicted. The latter are but hybrid beings, the solitary inhabitants of a world that is not readily recognizable. The grotesque, a quality which seems to have haunted the artist’s entire work to date, is again present here as the assertion of a hazy mental state.
Certain questions seem to recur in this most recent example of the artist’s investigations: how can a sense of instability be the result of an austere, meticulously arranged composition? Can a form that stands as the expression of inertia actually intimate a drive forward? How is the comical born of the tragic and vice versa? How can the familiar turn into something alien and how can a closed structure allude to one that is more open-ended?
Christidi has used charcoal for the past two years as her main expressive medium, which she employs to articulate a ‘monotonous’ language of vertical lines, passing though successive levels of ‘filtering’ before the end result is produced. The more her practice develops, the more she seems to aim at simplifying form to the maximum degree possible. Throughout these recent works shades of grey remain subdued, adding yet another question to the previous list: how can a ‘hushed’ grey express the full range of dramatic intensity?
"Charcoal Overload!"
Katerina Christidi solo exhibition, titled Charcoal Overload!, is scheduled to open on Thursday, 15th May 2008, at 19:30, at the Ileana Tounta Centre for Contemporary Art.
The exhibition will run until 21th June 2008.
Katerina Christidi presents a new series of large-scale drawings on canvas, created in 2007 and 2008. It is in fact a series of portraits, in which it is hard to determine either the age or sex of the individuals depicted. The latter are but hybrid beings, the solitary inhabitants of a world that is not readily recognizable. The grotesque, a quality which seems to have haunted the artist’s entire work to date, is again present here as the assertion of a hazy mental state.
Certain questions seem to recur in this most recent example of the artist’s investigations: how can a sense of instability be the result of an austere, meticulously arranged composition? Can a form that stands as the expression of inertia actually intimate a drive forward? How is the comical born of the tragic and vice versa? How can the familiar turn into something alien and how can a closed structure allude to one that is more open-ended?
Christidi has used charcoal for the past two years as her main expressive medium, which she employs to articulate a ‘monotonous’ language of vertical lines, passing though successive levels of ‘filtering’ before the end result is produced. The more her practice develops, the more she seems to aim at simplifying form to the maximum degree possible. Throughout these recent works shades of grey remain subdued, adding yet another question to the previous list: how can a ‘hushed’ grey express the full range of dramatic intensity?