Venue

KALFAYAN GALLERIES | ATHENS

11 Haritos Street
106 75 Kolonaki
Athens 

Kalfayan Galleries, Athens presents a group exhibition featuring Yiannis Papadopoulos, Panos Tsagaris and Kostis Velonis, titled Perished Sun.

In ancient Greece, the eclipse was considered to be an evil omen, an augury of discord and suffering. The endless eclipses that Greece has experienced during the last years, beyond being the pleasurable experience of an astronomical phenomenon, bear witness to the covert dimension that accompany superstitions.

The exhibition attempts to shed light on these signs that pass unseen through the routine of ordinariness. Together with the failures and setbacks in everyday life, the show translates them into a geometry of their elliptical shapes, their eclipses and shadows. This ambivalent approach to the eclipse in the projects of Yiannis Papadopoulos, Panos Tsagaris and Kostis Velonis is transcribed as a resistance to pre-existing structures, as an error that seeks its continuation, the tension of a disorder that becomes the product of creativity and revision of the established order.

Yiannis Papadopoulos (b.1975, Patras, Greece) lives and works in Athens and Antwerp. He holds an MFA from AKV St. Joost Academie (Breda NL). He has studied Arts at the Athens School of Fine Arts, Typography at the Plantin Moretus Institute Antwerp and Mathematics at the University of Patras. By distilling knowledge and through aesthetic economy Papadopoulos repurposes classic and obscure references for present cultural and political concerns. Recent past and upcoming shows include “Egkainia” (curated by PAT), Contemporary Greek Art Institute (ISE), Athens 2017; “DESTE Prize”, Museum of Cycladic Art Museum, Athens, 2015; “The Ister”, Extra City Kunsthall, Antwerp, 2015; “Actopolis” (curated by PAT), Goethe Institute, Athens 2016; “Troubleshooting (remainders, ditches, trials)” (curated by Radical Reading), Jupiter Woods, London, 2016; “Billboard”(public work curated by Sanja Tomic)”, Antwerp, 2016. Residencies: Frans Masereel Centrum (2014, 2012); Istituto Ellenico di studi Bizantini e Postbizantini di Venezia, 2014. Grants (artistic and research): Kunsten en Erfgoed, Flemish Government (2014, 2015-16), V. Valambous prize 2010, IKY studies grants 2008-2010.

Panos Tsagaris (b. 1979, Athens, Greece) received his BFA from the Emily Carr Institute of Art & Design in Vancouver, Canada. He has exhibited extensively in Miami, New York, Vancouver, Athens, Berlin, Vienna, Milan, Paris, Hong Kong et al. Upcoming group shows include: “Baker’s Dozen VI” (group show), Torrance Art Museum, California (USA); “Looking for the Clouds” / European Month of Photography, Casino Luxemburg; Canakkale Biennale, Kunsthalle Osnabrück, Germany. Recent solo shows: “Let the Sun Protest”, MLF Gallery, Rome. “TIME”, Kalfayan Galleries, Athens (2016); “Studies in Symbology”, 68 Projects, Berlin (2016); “APOCATASTASIS”, Stems Gallery, Brussels (2016). Group shows include: “And Now the Good News, Works from the Annette and Peter Nobel Collection”, MASI Museum, Lugano, (2016);  “Unstable Fields” , Benaki Museum, Athens, (2016); “Language of the Birds: Occult and Art”, New York University’s 80WSE Gallery, New York (2016);  “The Billboard Creative”, organized by The Billboard Creative (TBC), 913 Highland Ave, Los Angeles, USA (2015); 4th International Canakkale Biennale (2014); “No Country For Young Men. Contemporary Greek Art in Times of Crisis”, Bozar, Brussels (2014); 4th Thessaloniki Biennale of Contemporary Art (2013); “Nostalgia Nervosa”, ReMap 4, State of Concept Gallery, Athens (2013); “Picatrix: Davide Balliano & Panos Tsagaris”, Galerie Michel Rein, Paris (2013); “THE GARDEN OF EDEN – EVIL – Near-Far”, Palais de Tokyo, Paris; (2012) “Gold”, Imperial Belvedere Palace Museum, Vienna; “The Quality of Presence”, Chelsea Hotel, New York (2012); OU.UN.PO. Symposium, archaeological site of Elefsina, Greece (2011); “The West at Sunset”, Abrons Arts Center, New York (2010); 2nd Thessaloniki Biennale & Performance Festival (2009).  Panos Tsagaris lives and works between Los Angeles and New York. He is represented by Kalfayan Galleries, Athens – Thessaloniki.

­Kostis Velonis (b.1968) lives and works in Athens. He holds an MRes in Humanities and Cultural Studies from London Consortium (Birkbeck College, ICA, AA, Tate). He studied Arts Plastiques/ Esthétiques at Université Paris 8 (Maitrise,D.E.A). He earned his PhD from the Department of Architecture, N.T.U.A University of Athens. Through his work he emphasizes the contradictions that reside within the social dimension of freedom and the redefinition of ethics through domesticity. Recent and upcoming group and solo shows include: 2017: “Precision German Craftsmanship” (solo show), Akademie Schloss Solitude, Stuttgart, Germany; “Urgent Conversations: Athens-Antwerp” Museum of Contemporary Art Antwerp (M HKA), Antwerp, Belgium; “Memory of Revolution”, State Museum of Contemporary Art, Thessaloniki, Greece; Eco Art (Akamas Project), Paphos/ European Capital of Culture 2017, Cyprus; “The Kids Want Communism”, MoBY Museums of Bat Yam, Bat Yam, Israel; 2016: “Genii Loci. Greek Art, 1930 – today”, Manege Central Exhibition Hall, St. Petersburg, Russia; “Urgent Conversations: Athens-Antwerp”, National Museum of Contemporary Art (EMST), Athens, Greece; “Part Company” (solo show), Casa Maauad, Mexico City, Mexico; 2015: “This probably will not work”, Lothringer 13-Städtische Kunsthalle München, Μunich; “Super superstudio”, PAC, Milan; “Adventures of the Black Square: Abstract Art and Society 1915 –2015”, Whitechapel Gallery, London; “The Traveler and his Shadow” (solo show), Art Proposals, Nicosia, Cyprus. 2014: “The Theater of the World”, Museo Tamayo, Mexico City; “This is Not My Beautiful House”, Kunsthalle Athena 2014, “No Country for Young Men”, BOZAR, Brussels. Residencies 2016: Akademie Schloss Solitude, Stuutgard, Germany; Casa Maauad, Mexico City, Mexico. Currently he is artist in residence at Akademie Schloss Solitude, Stuttgart, Germany.