WOANDERS
Maria Papacharalambous
Exhibition curation: Evagoras Vanezis
Marking Maria Papacharalambous’ thirty years of continuous presence on the local and international art scene, The Lefteris Economou Cultural Foundation presents the project ‘woanders’, curated by art theorist, researcher and curator Evagoras Vanezis.
Papacharalambous’ diverse oeuvre includes painting, installations, video and short films, theatre sets and costumes, renovated ruins, and social sculpture. Vigorously exploring the possibilities and boundaries of painting -the medium in which she started- she exchanges its traditional tools and materials with other techniques and objects, whilst using surfaces other than the canvas. For the artist, art and life are simultaneous processes of movement, exchange, and reflection. Seeking the coordinates of their relationality, she also organised socio-artistic happenings, provided meals and platforms for discussions, created art foundations.
Inspired by her exhibition history, the title ‘woanders’, as a play of words in English, brings together the aporia and marvel of ‘wonder’ and the roving of ‘wander’. In German, it is a word which means ‘elsewhere’ and also ‘where else?’, when expressed as a question. ‘woanders’ is also the conceptual framework of the research methodology on which the making of the exhibition and publication is based, understood as an open, collaborative space of exploration into an under-construction archive. This archiving aims to unravel Papacharalambous’ mingling with the aesthetic sensibilities of our times as a trembling that oscillates between philosophies of becoming and a search for a practical aesthetic of existence.
The exhibition consists of a selection of works from the beginning of her artistic practice up to the present day, with many of the works being shown for the first time. A new soundscape by composer and sound artist Antonis Antoniou is presented, which utilises Papacharalambous’ recordings from her early studies in singing, to create a sonic collage. In collaboration with CYENS – Centre of Excellence, a wandering in the artists’ home and studio is effected by way of virtual reality. The curation of the exhibition space is realised with artist, poet and curator Christos Kyriakides. The publication, developed in collaboration between Papacharalambous and Vanezis and designed by Philippos Vassiliades, includes archival material and texts by the two. In addition, it includes a literary response by performance artist, writer, and poet Thomas Diafas.
The project is accompanied by a series of parallel events and actions in the exhibition space, whilst the for the workshop ‘on why we need gardens’, the artist invites us to her personal space, where by utilising the art of gardening and giving it philosophical connotations, a collective experience of reflection is created. The workshop is realised in collaboration with artist Kyriakos Theocharous.
Brief CV
Maria Papacharalambous (b.1964, Cyprus) is an artist based in Nicosia. In thirty years of presence in her local and international scene, she has created a diverse oeuvre that includes painting, installations, video and short films, theatre sets and costumes, renovated ruins, and social sculpture.
For the artist art and life are simultaneous processes of movement, exchange, and reflection. Seeking the coordinates of their relationality, she also organised socio-artistic happenings, provided meals and platforms for discussions, created art foundations. Searching for ancient and contemporary forms of knowledge, she finds herself charmed with universal truths, alchemies of all sorts and always by the power of poetry to transform nothing into something.
Her intentions are to encode, recycle and orchestrate colours, images, concepts, materials and energies, so as to transform the insignificant into the important, the intangible into matter and give meaning to existence. Enchanted by the fascinating amalgamations of colour, the differences between organic and inorganic materials, she is always creating, consciously or unconsciously, as a necessity for inner balance and internal self-catharsis.
She is a graduate of the Athens School of Fine Arts (with distinction) and the Athens National Conservatory. She completed a postgraduate degree at the Universidad Complutense de Madrid, Spain and holds various certificates of expertise in philosophy, neurolinguistic programming, and philosophical counselling. Her work is in numerous public and private collections.
