The human figure in modern Cypriot art
Limassol exhibition looks at how we have seen ourselves in modern times
At a time when art features people in all their different forms an exhibition based on ‘The Human Figure in Modern Cypriot Art – the first generations’ continues in Limassol.
The exhibition of 100 paintings offers a run through thehistory of modern art in Cyprus and illustrates how much Cypriot artists have concentrated on adorning the human figure, sometimes depicting it through scenes of everyday life. The works on show have been brought together via loans from the State Collection of Contemporary Cypriot Art, the Municipal Gallery of Limassol, the Gallery of the Makarios Foundation, and private collections dating from back in the 70s. Many of the paintings have never been on public display before and curator Antonis Danos has made a point out of breathing air back into these works of art that have been locked up since the 1930s, 40s and 50s.
The exhibition offers a wide range of human figures. A nod in the direction of Fauvism, Expressionism and variants of Cubism is evident in some of the landscape material. A world is presented in which a human being is harmoniously integrated into the environment, either natural landscaping or built space, emphasising village life. Depictions such as these, make a very idyllic and romantic image of country life from an urban point of view, despite hints of it being a very tough one. A similar inclination is also present in images from the urban realm.
Other parts of the presentation depict the human figure in the public domain. Included in what seems like a peasant world with coffeehouses and bazaars blended in the background, the domination of men in Cyprus back then is apparent as there aren’t any women in the picture. Women appear more often in images from the urban, social space, reflecting the traditional assignment of the household as their domain. The genre of works where women are most frequently seen are nudes,corresponding to similar patterns in early European modernism.
The obsession with women continues throughout most of the exhibits but in cases displaying the human figure as an ‘archetype and an agent of collectivity’, men, monks and other types of people are also subjects. Women are seen as anarchaic figures, agents of perennial heritage and as mothers, or the source of life. Figures from the traditional Cypriot world are transformed into symbols of collective struggles, yearnings and expectations.
Another part of the five dimensional project, figurative painting, can also be seen as a formalist element. Any thematic, conceptual, and ideological reference contained in the human figure constitutes secondary or incidental elements. The artists’ emphasis, and sometimes sole interest, concern the creation of purely modernist works. The human figure is indeed negotiated as a formal-compositional element, reaching the point of near abolishment.
The most intriguing part of the exhibition is definitely the artistic approach to the many problems that were faced by the Cypriot community years and years ago. But also as a medium to recognise and understand the ability to draw, paint and create such a lively picture of Cyprus as it was seen through the eyes of old inhabitants.
The Human Figure in Modern Cypriot Art – the first generations
Exhibition at the Evagoras and Kathleen Lanitis foundation in collaboration with the Cultural Services of the Ministry of Education and CultureUntil June 12. Open daily except Mondays, 9am-1pm and 5pm-9pm. Tel: 25-342123
