Current Residents

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Current Resident: Nov 1, 2022–Dec 31, 2022

Studio #303

Iria Vrettou

Iria Vrettou’s practice focuses on concepts and modes of hybridity as research and practice methods, while also addressing aspects of hand-drawn animation in relation to larger cinematic and performative practices. Her research focuses on environmental and social issues, as well as the function of the ‘screen’ in the context of cultural production and political processes. She also investigates the creation of art works that can function as disquieting, complete spatiotemporal experiences.

Iria Vrettou has exhibited work at Onassis Stegi, Athens; CYLINDER gallery, Seoul; ERGO Collective, Athens; and Space 52, Athens, among others.

Events & Exhibitions

2022 Fall Open Studios

November 18–November 19, 2022

‘Daemonic Ecran Vivant’ is a moving portrait based on the concept of Tableau Vivant. The piece operates on specific hand drawn animated loops. The emphasis is placed on the movement of bodies, human, non-human, and more-than-human. It investigates how such movements can be perceived as dance for various concepts & species and the atmospheres that these create. If we consider life cycles as an expression of symbiosis then we can easily discern a ritual of perpetual transformation: the choreography of life. Image #2

Iria Vrettou, Daemonic Ecran Vinant, 2020, moving image, 1:33 min.

“Necropsy of a Void (9 and a half Serenades for the exorcism of Ghosts)” is an animated film created by Adrianos Efthymiadis and Iria Vrettou, commissioned for the exhibition “Is Everybody In? The Ceremony is about to begin.” The work responded to the concept of the exhibition which explored the meaning and emerging forms of ‘the ritual’. Necropsy of a Void, is an elegy, a song about an impossible ritual: these nine and a half serenades ritualize this process of necropsy of the void, to sing the impossible process of conceptualizing the void and cutting into it, to conjure ghosts past and ghosts’ future, invite them in a dance, much like the dances that are lost to us because of the pandemic, in the break that we experience.

Iria Vrettou, Necropsy of a Void (9 and a half Serenades for the Exorcism of Ghosts), 2021, moving image, 8:47 min.

In 1612 Galileo wrote to his friend, the painter Lodovico Cardi, known as Cigoli: “The statue does not have its relief by virtue of being wide, long and deep but by virtue of being light in some places and dark in others. And one should note as proof of this that only two of its three dimensions are actually exposed to the eye: length and width (which is the superficies . . . that is to say, periphery or circumference). For, of the objects appearing and seen, we see nothing but their superficies; their depth cannot be perceived by the eye because our vision does not penetrate opaque bodies. The eye then sees only length and width and nev- er thickness. Thus, since thickness is never exposed to view, nothing but length and width can be perceived by us in a statue. We know of depth, not as a visual experience per se and absolutely but only be accident and in relation to light and darkness. And all this is present in painting no less than sculpture... But sculpture receives lightness and darkness from nature herself whereas painting receives it from art.”

Iria Vrettou, Galileo's Relief, 2016, moving image, 1:15 min.

his bush is a feeling “ is a performative piece that, animates a discussion and queers space in order to conjure unexpected identities. Identities arising from within the Volcano and materialising out into in the botanical garden”

Iria Vrettou, This bush is a feeling, 2022, performance, 20:00 min.

Homer Dreamt Before He Slept”, is a video-installation performance by Iria Vrettou which was done as part of Ios Festival 2021 and took place at the square of a small church. The performance conjures Iria (female primordial god-messenger) who blurs the Homeric myth with Hesiod’s cosmology. This performance is part of an ongoing research on myth and ritual vis a vis body politics and queer ecologies. The music is composed by artist Anto Lopez.

Iria Vrettou, This bush is a feeling, 2021, performance video, 12:00 min.

Residents from Greece

Dimitra Kondylatou

LUXENIA, 4K, stereo, (& DCP 5.1), 24fps, 2.39:1, 00:10:04, 2021

Greece

ARTWORKS

2022

Ιris Touliatou

Greece

ARTWORKS

2021

Stefania Strouza

Greece

The J.F. Costopoulos Foundation

2021

France, French Guiana, Guadeloupe, Martinique

Current Resident: Nov 1, 2022–Jan 31, 2023

Tauck Ritzau Innovative Philanthropy

Studio #304

Artist

Johanna Mirabel

Johanna Mirabel explores pictorial representation, shifting between abstraction, expressionism, and realism. She stages contradictions and juxtapositions using lush vegetation, partially present and disparate objects to evoke the inherent complexity of life between different cultures. Inspired by Glissant’s Creolisation, Mirabel creates pictorial forms that appear to be in constant motion, in which the characters are embedded, nested, and ready to merge in their moving environment. The artist invites us to inhabit her work, mentally exploring them as parallel realities, as she moves between painting and sculpture.

Johanna Mirabel has exhibited work at Espace des Femmes Antoinette Fouque, Paris; Luce Gallery, Torino; and Manifesta, Lyon, among others.

johannamirabel.com

Events & Exhibitions

2022 Fall Open Studios

November 18–November 19, 2022

The classical genre painting is tinged with bright colors, a reference to Tembé, an abstract art typically Guyanese recognizable by the use of red, yellow and blue. Some works are dominated by ochre and red whose different shades evoke the chromatic richness of the land of Guyana.

Johanna Mirabel, Living Room n.18, 2022, oil on canvas, 90 × 57 in. (228.6 × 144.78 cm)

The home that Johanna Mirabel depicts is the scene of a tension between universal and intimate. In the home, as in her work, only a limited circle of acquaintances is invited to enter. Thus, the figures that inhabit her paintings are inspired by friends or family members with whom the artist has strong ties.

Johanna Mirabel, Living Room n.10, 2021, oil on canvas, 78 × 81 in. (198.12 × 205.74 cm)

A place of intimacy par excellence, the layout of the space translates a way of life specific to each person, reflects a sensitivity and is embellished over time with memories sometimes materialized in objects. The organization of the home also varies according to culture, yet its evocation refers to a shared imagination. Far from being isolated, the home is for Johanna Mirabel a privileged place to connect with the world. «Act in your place, think with the world» suggested Édouard Glissant, a poet whose writings and concepts inspire the artist. The home becomes the island from which we enter into relationship with the world. This is why in his works, the border between inside and outside is porous. The spaces are delimited but never closed. Beyond the openings, doors or windows, the composition itself invites to leave the canvas. To accompany the imagination and reinforce the idea of interpenetration between the work and the place in which it is exhibited, stretched sections of canvas are sometimes freed from the painting to unfold on the wall.

Johanna Mirabel, Living Room n.8, 2021, oil on canvas, 96

The creation of space no longer relies on perspective but on the combination of color fields, on the cohabitation of pictorial writings that redefine the inside-outside complex and give free rein to the floating of the characters. Thwarting the conventional stakes that order the world around converging vanishing lines in order to define a frame deemed stable for the human figure. By superimposing, revealing and obscuring details through constant changes between ground and space, dissolving figuration into abstraction, it is a question of offering a certain distance between the model and the spectator.

Johanna Mirabel, Cascade, 2020, oil on canvas, 76 × 85 in. (193.04 × 215.9 cm)

Breaking down artistic approaches, she mixes precise figurative representation and abstraction. Detailed faces and sketched silhouettes take place in these worlds where time seems to be suspended. The multiplicity of vanishing points reinforces the strange and dissonant character of the represented scenes. In Johanna Mirabel’s world, nature has a special place. By removing vegetation from its ornamental status, the artist questions our relationship to the environment. These interiors inhabited by domestic plants and invested by vegetation become real microcosms. New balances reconciling nature and culture are then experimented.

Johanna Mirabel, Living Room n.14, 2022, oil on canvas, 78 × 86 in. (198.12 × 218.44 cm)

United States

Current Resident: Jul 1, 2022–Jun 30, 2023

Toby Devan Lewis

Studio #305

Artist

Sarah Tortora

Sarah Tortora draws inspiration from canonical sculptures, urban infrastructure, and museum display. Her work alternates between relational warmth and misidentification, and functions parallel to language to create intuitive replicas of archetypal objects. Tortora’s work conjures the psychic displacement necessary to comprehend the cultural displacement such archetypes can induce. The artist accepts the premise that every equestrian monument is truly a Trojan horse, and questions legacies of labor across geological time.

Sarah Tortora has exhibited work at Ulterior Gallery, New York; C. Grimaldis Gallery, Baltimore; and NADA x Foreland, Catskill, among others.

sarahtortora.com

Events & Exhibitions

2022 Fall Open Studios

November 18–November 19, 2022

A lifesize off-white vessel with a gritty papery texture, which has a black modelled gridded armature partially exposed. The vessel is not perfectly symmetrical. It undulates in a slightly awkward way. There is a black modelled Greek key design on the exterior of the vessel at the rim which encircles the form. Inside the vessel, a variety of pastel colors are mixed with white paint to create a subtle glowing effect within.

Sarah Tortora, Yolanda, 2018, paper pulp, epoxy clay, plywood, acrylic and latex paint, 64 × 35 × 36 in. (162.56 × 88.9 × 91.44 cm)

A life-size faded, grey, stone-textured vertical stele form sits atop a subdued lime green, smooth-textured rectangular pedestal which sits flat on the floor. The stele form is subtly curved in the shape of a gravestone. There is an organic, but rectangular shaped cutout in the center of the stele form, revealing its interior as well as a mosaic of wood fragments that are framed within the shallow interior of the cutout. The wood fragments are plywood, pine, and hardboard. Some of them are treated with a green or black paint wash. The wood mosaic forms taper off inside the form and consolidate toward the base.

Sarah Tortora, Tonguetied (Mirror for the Unthought Known), 2020, wood composites, plywood, pine, gypsum cement, acrylic and latex paint, 76 × 48 × 18 in. (193.04 × 121.92 × 45.72 cm)

This sculpture sits within a 3-4 foot square, and sits flat on the floor, extending no more than 40”in height. The bottom of this form is made of concrete which has different stones, minerals, and construction debris embedded in it. There are chunks of broken asphalt, large scallop shells, fragments of fallen graffiti, and unidentifiable minerals. The concrete and stones are cast in staggering layers; some stick out 3-4” from the central base form. There are also areas where black epoxy clay or epoxy resin had been modelled or poured over areas of shallow concrete. Appearing to be wedged within the concrete base is a fragmented drywall structure, which juts upward in enclosed, angular construction. On one side of the form, the concrete base is very short, and so are the drywall fragments. Toward the center, the concrete base gains height and so does the drywall form; utilizing larger and larger pieces of drywall toward the top of the form, which is cut into a crenelated, castle-like shape.

Sarah Tortora, Acropalypse, 2020, drywall, cement, epoxy resin, acrylic & latex paint, found minerals and construction debris, 33 × 38 × 44 in. (83.82 × 96.52 × 111.76 cm)

A sculpture comprised of a 4-‘5’ tall by 1’ wide cartoonish leg, appearing to move to the left, is thickly outlined by black painted wood, with an abstract, atmospheric recessed painting within this framing. Grey and white are the dominant colors painted on the leg, with occasional wisps of blue, yellow, and copper. Atop the leg sits a tapering white rectangular form, which extends perpendicularly from the leg on a downward tilt to the right, and hovers just over a massive stone-like structure to the right of the leg. The stone structure is approximately the same height as the leg, but three feet wide. It is a warm white, and the surface is sanded to reveal patches of light blue, green, and grey underneath. Embedded within this stone structure is a very graphic black X shape made from wood, that is not symmetrical. The upper left “leg” of the X meets the top of the leg to support the white tapering form, while the opposing upper right “leg” of the X is embedded fully in the stone structure.

Sarah Tortora, Wayward Queen, 2021, plywood, wood composites, gypsum cement, resin, acrylic and latex paint, 55 × 35 × 58 in. (139.7 × 88.9 × 147.32 cm)