Cyprus Mail
Where the (peculiar) streets have a name
The six artists who have stood up to the challenge and who will stand united at the exhibition’s opening on Friday are Adonis Archontides, Falak Shawwa, Ivie Nicolaidou, Maria Andronikou, Tereza Kleovoulou and Vaggelis Mina.
Lellos Art Point in Limassol will be showcasing a group photography exhibition on Friday, entitled ‘Street with a Twist: Capturing Patterns of the (Peculiar) Everyday Life’.
The six Cyprus-based photographers display their perception of the streets of cities across Europe and beyond in this exhibition, which invites us all to see streets and the lives they lead a little differently.
Each photographer brings to the old town of Limassol their very own personally customised narrative of each city, creating a series of unique frames in which each city speaks to the observer, while also creating an open line of communication between the images of streets.
By capturing these fleeting moments, the trivial and the mundane, these pictures give us an outlook onto countless stories and possibilities. They are keepers of time, of space and of stories, which will echo in the ears of coming generations. The twists held by each image will most likely change the way we see streets forever, and make us see art where we hadn’t noticed it before.
The six artists who have stood up to the challenge and who will stand united at the exhibition’s opening on Friday are Adonis Archontides, Falak Shawwa, Ivie Nicolaidou, Maria Andronikou, Tereza Kleovoulou and Vaggelis Mina.
Archontides presents an autobiographical journey through Amsterdam, Copenhagen and Rome. The photographs he has chosen to put on show display a very personal perspective – and, when you look upon the images, you may feel like you are looking at his personal holiday photo-album.
Shawwa concentrates on the small details of streets, for her these features are hidden treasures which are trapped in the everyday life which pulses through these streets. So expect the ordinary to be reflected in the extraordinary.
Nicolaidou sees cities through the bicycles on their streets and presents us with a whole portfolio of bicycle diaries, as she puts it. By capturing images of this human-driven vehicle, the photographer captures the journeys that we dream of having, the laid-back travels which ask us to travel lightly and soak up everything around us.
Andronikou’s images are so natural that the notion of staging a scene like the one captured on film comes to mind. Like the other five photographers whose work will accompany hers in the exhibition, Andronikou freezes the details hidden away in the ordinary streets on which we spend our days.
The scenes depicted in her current photographic work are somehow tributes to the character of each individual city. She captures five cities at their finest by stripping away any effect which may result in displaying a beauty which is fake and artificial, maintains their rawness, and accurately represents these urban landscapes.
Kleovoulou’s dreamy gaze creates frames that are borderline abstract. Familiar shapes lose their meaning and become parts of a modified actuality. The photographer used her camera as a microscope and zoomed in on the streets of Limassol. But the images of the streets in the photographs are not how we would recall the streets of the city, as they take on a surrealistic form and re-construct reality.
Mina’s images also alter reality and create a series of “little planets,” as he says – and goes on to say that, in order to be able to master the effect, one has to visualise the final outcome before even taking the photograph.
Street with a Twist: Capturing Patterns of the (Peculiar) Everyday Life
Group photography exhibition. Opens February 27, 7.30pm until March 9. Lellos ART point. 211 Saint Andrew Street, Limassol. Monday-Friday: 8am-6pm. Saturday 9am-1pm. Tel: 25-363628
By Maria Gregoriou