A Collection of Painful Art
The exhibition “A Collection of Painful Art” opens on January 19 at the ArtWall Project Space, together with a series of screenings and talks until Saturday January 28.
“Many of the most popular genres of narrative art are designed to elicit negative emotions: emotions that are experienced as painful or involving some degree of pain”, notes Aaron Smuts, PhD. Philosophy, University of Wisconsin-Madison in his Journal of Aesthetic Education, 2007. “Is there a fundamental difference between the kinds of emotional responses we seek from art and those we seek from life?”
In search of artists whose work touches on issues of pain (painful), we discovered art that exposes itself through a critical, humorous stimuli, symbolism and metaphors, as work which displays an acute directless that may often bring the audience close to embarrassment. The exhibition "A Collection of Painful Art" is presented in fact, as a small personal collection, a fetich revealed to the public. Without doubt, this thematic is endless and extends beyond this exhibition, across borders and between cultures.
Participating artists: Eleanna Balesi, Christos Chrissopoulos, Vassilis Pantelidis, Giannis Sinioroglou, Andreas Vousouras.
Screenings, Talks
Friday, January 20, 19:30
Anna Vasof: Climbing Mountains / Live presentation of 18 small scale inventions
Anna Vasof presents a series of small scale inventions - performative, mechanical objects, which is the main idea that is represented in her artwork. A machine that reacts only upon its dissolution, shoes that translate leg movement to geopolitical events, prosthetic nails - carpentry tools and 15 more inventions.
Saturday, January 21, 20:00
IV | Nikos Giavropoulos / Video Screening and Talk
"Madonna", "Aphrodite", "Selfexile, "Meta-Oedipous", 4 videos representing key turning points in the career of artist Nikos Giavropoulos, screened on Saturday, January 21 in the exhibition "A collection of Painful Art". The presentation opens with the artist’s first video entitled "Madonna" (1992), a work that was produced as a result of six years of study and experimentation. The video won first short art video art prize for the "Mediaterra" European Video Art Festival organized by the Fournos Center of Art and Technology. The second video, "Aphrodite" was first presented in 2005 - same venue – and has participated in several video art festival in Greece and abroad. "Selfexile" the Special Odysseus award winning Best video art at the London Greek Film Festival films in 2013, is the third video presented. The screening closes with "Meta-Oedipous" (2016), presented as a video performance at the Benaki Museum in the exhibition [OUT] TOPIAS, performances and outdoor / public space.
Thursday, January 26, 20:00
Christos Chrissopoulos, ANGST / Reading with simultaneous video projection
“Literature has to deal with anguish”: following this conviction expressed by Georges Bataille in his only television interview to Pierre Dumayet in 1957, Christos Chrissopoulos is self-athologized creating a narrative territory inhabited by an isolated consciousness of ephemerality.
Opening: Thursday, January 19, 19:30
Duration: January 19 - January 28, 2017
Hours: Friday, January 20 - Friday, January 2017: 17:00 – 20:00
Saturday, January 28: 13:00 – 16:00
The Artwall Project Space was initiated in July 2012 as a result of collaboration between the Fresh Hotel Athens and CHEAPART. The aim of the Artwall was to showcase contemporary art and become a catalyst for discussion and collaboration among artists and art professionals. The Artwall's program was designed and implemented (2012-2017) by Fotini Kapiris, artist and curator, to meet requirements and standards of contemporary artistic production.
ArtWall Project Space
26 Sofokleous Str., 10552, Athens
