Through the prism of a skewed sense of realism, Giotis’ work suggests a filter to the perception of our surroundings. Large scale paintings reinforce a sense of ambiguity by absorbing the gaze of the viewer, exploring the idea that reality is plural and shared.
I forgot your name
A man is laying down. At rest. The surface is one and at the same time divided in different areas. Separated by invisible lines between colours.
In the studio the paintings are laying on top of each other, ready to reveal themselves.
The exhibition is the moment of selection.
At first it’s only a mix of colours. Then a geometry, inherited from history, from hundreds of years of composition, to the elegancy of abstraction.
The use of large formats amplifies the physical response. It’s bigger than your eye.
It’s a wall in movement.
In the meantime a landscape appears. A garden at night. Branches and moons. Maybe a street from a familiar neighbourhood. Some trash down on the floor. Empty beer, empty cigarettes. Still a man laying. Painting as the main character.
Dark colours fullfill the background. Brushes all over you. A waterfall of sadness (dripping).
A giant hangover in hell. A surrealistic mourning.
There are many ways to tell a story. With a silent picture there is no beginning and no end. L’oeil infiltrates everything. It’s a perpetual discovery where time transforms everything. You are losing yourself by absorption. You are laying down too. The gaze is unpredictable.
(back and forth between realities)
At the end it’s just a moment where affection disappears and leaves a metallic taste in our mouths. References are in every corner. A cinematic filter, falling from the top, creates the horizon.
It creates a sky between trees. Again the moon, suspended over the flesh. The paint irradiates.
A variation in time and space, alongside the white cube. Hypnotic rectangles floating in raw light.
A few steps in and you are hit by a moonstroke. A dead tree is the gate of a second world made out of shades and loneliness.
Florent Frizet
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Konstantinos Giotis (b.1988) lives and works in Athens. He studied at the Slade School of Fine Art, UCL (MFA Painting 2015), at the Department of Fine Arts and Art Sciences, University of Ioannina (BA, 2013) and at the Faculty of Fine Arts of the Complutense University of Madrid (2011).
In his practice, desires, fantasies or autobiographical deviations function as points of departure from which to explore representation, ambiguity, and painting tropes as building blocks for the construction of a contemporary imaginary. Recent exhibitions include: “Encore: New Greek Pain- ting”, The Municipal Gallery of Athens (Athens, 2023), “Igni” a proposal by Florent Frizet, GB Agency (Paris, 2023), “180×120”, Haus N (Athens, 2023), “This Current Between us”, PPC Historic Steam Electric Station of Neo Faliro, (Athens, 2023), “Cycladic Café Art Project”, Museum of Cycladic Art, (Athens, 2022), “Outsourcing the Maybe”, Ainalaiyn Space, (London, 2022) “There is nothing inevitable about time”, Tavros (Athens, 2022), “Head2Head”, KEIV (Athens, 2021) “Beyond Nostalgia Hijack”, CAN Christina Androulidaki Gallery (Athens, 2021).
