Press release

An Elegy for Coming Undone presents new series of works painted on deadstock raw silk collected from fabric stores across Cyprus. The rich history of Cypriot sericulture threads through craft, commerce, exploitation, colonisation, and domestic and industrial production but has repeatedly excluded the posthumanist perspective of the silkworm, whose lifecycle is violently interrupted in the process.

Over time, the artist’s interaction with the silk lays the foundations for an interspecies dialogue that actively negotiates with the material’s symbolic connotations and expands the notions of biopolitics and power. Beyond biochemical and industrial processes, this dialogue also considers socio-ecological interdependencies and crises, literal and metaphorical fertility/infertility, and the struggle for metamorphosis on an increasingly toxic planet.

By exploring non-human death, these works invite a closer inspection of how death, spirituality and transformation are invisibilised within a society addicted to extending life and youth. The artist draws inspiration from marginalised and persecuted women's collectives across time and place, who conjure spells that tend to the community, the land and the waters, making and protecting spaces for solace and regeneration. The psycho-spiritual 'landscapes' marked in alizarin claret, amethyst, quinacridone gold, naphthol red, green gold and other deadly pigments engulf the exhibition space. Accompanying the paintings is a commissioned sound piece by electronic musician Spivak, co-produced with Odysseos.

Public Programme

Workshop Painting as lexicon: symbolism, ritual, practice 19 & 26 October, 2 November, 18:00 – 20:00

Artist & curator in conversation Material entanglements: spells & superstitions 3 November, 19:00 - 20:30

Listening session Sleep comes dropping with Spivak 19 November, 19:00 – 20:00

Supported by Culture Services of the Cyprus Deputy Ministry of Culture

With special thanks to Moufflon Bookshop, Dr Georg Kremer, Ioanna Gerakidi, Rumen Tropchev, Leontios Toumpouris, Andreas Mallouris, Orestis Lazouras, Loizos and Miltos Hadjioannou, Edison, Tatiana Ataliani, Constantinos Odysseos, Eleni Athanasiou, Andonis Moushis, Kouyoumjian Fabrics, Sipone Textiles, N.V. Vapsis Ltd, Yiannoula Skourou Fabrics, Jawad Nazzal, Dr Anthi Andronikou, Phytorio Visual Artists and Art Theorists Association.

Poem by Ioanna Gerakidi

Laments

for arrhythmic sounds, vocal chasms and whispers

 

1.

 

acts of faith and orbit
spells celestial earths
their wounds and
wombs archives of suns
and moons half full
or blues
spirits have no names
they can only hear your psalms
so yell louder
              

                                                          a refuge
                                                                         to be sheltered

                                                                         from danger

Reading List

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