What’s on By Jill Campbell Mackay

Celebrating the female form

Nude woman in bright colours to help you relax

Recent research has shown that stressed out individuals who spend even thirty minutes in the quiet confines of an art gallery will have an almost immediate 45 per cent drop in stress levels. On average, those studied has 32 per cent less of the stress hormone cortisol in their blood when they left than when they entered. Normally it would take around five hours for this substance in the body to fall this far. The exhibit in question consisted of images created by many different artists of ordinary people sitting, reading, doing everyday activities in full, glorious colour.

That’s why I started off talking about stress, because an exhibition is currently showing at the Kyklos gallery which should definatly drop your blood pressure. Jackie Pentalioti’s paintings almost describe her physical appearance in that she is also a neat, compact figure of a woman, imbued with a certain gamin sense of detailed style. There’s maybe just a tiny hint of shyness in her demeanour but, it’s totally overridden by her ability to immerse herself in the painting of the female form.

After studying at Northampton College, Jackie went on to gain an MA at Sheffield University, then, in 1990, a holiday romance saw her move permanently to Cyprus. For the first ten years of marriage, Jackie’s creative energies were directed towards the family business – running the Tea for Two caf? in Paphos. Only recently has she put down her pastry brush to make brush marks on canvas.

Jackie uses her palette to create a perfect sense of composition with loads of vibrant colour and rich textures. A big influence on her subject matter has been the perennial works of James Joseph Tissot. This immensely popular Victorian painter was credited with being the first social realist of his time; in his paintings he defined perfectly the age he lived in, with furniture-laden parlours, elegant socialites, doll-faced girls rippling in layers of lace and solid, red-coated, bewhiskered soldiers.

Jackie’s nudes celebrate the beauty of the female form, inviting us to enjoy the sheer beauty of the human form and take comfort in the fact that by just standing and looking at these beautiful calming images, stress levels will immediately plummet.

Exhibition of Paintings by Jackie Pentalioti

Until June 17. Kyklos Gallery, Kato Paphos. Opening hours: 10am-1 pm and 4pm-7pm. Monday to Saturday. Tel: 26 936681

The Cyprus Mail is the only English-language daily newspaper published in Cyprus. It was established in 1945 and today, with its popular and widely-read website, the Cyprus Mail is among the most trusted news sites in Cyprus. The newspaper is not affiliated with any political parties and has always striven to maintain its independence. Over the past 70-plus years, the Cyprus Mail, with a small dedicated team, has covered momentous events in Cyprus’ modern history, chronicling the last gasps of British colonial rule, Cyprus’ truncated independence, the coup and Turkish invasion, and the decades of negotiations to stitch the divided island back together, plus a myriad of scandals, murders, and human interests stories that capture the island and its -people. Observers describe it as politically conservative.