Iota Daseia | Cyprus in Venice

Iota Daseia
Glafkos Koumides

Eleni Nikita

After graduating from the AA School of Architecture in London, Koumidis went on to study psychology in Cologne, and has since maintained strong links with Germany. From the late 70s, he concentrated on art and writing, initially combining these two practices. The two facets of his work, which later started growing autonomously, project an idiosyncratic worldview. His series of literary writings, issued by Poupouxios Publications, are characteristically critical of the mentalities, behaviours, belief systems and power relations of his native society; the themes, symbolisms and concepts prevalent in his art works – mainly installations, paintings and etchings – to which he applies the term Icasmata, denoting the speculative, arbitrary nature of the artistic product, are created in the same spirit. In Venice, Koumides staged a series of sculptural installations with direct references to everyday tools and furnishings typical of Cypriot folk culture and Byzantine traditions, using materials such as wood, metal, string, wax and fabric. Out of an original number of 40 works, the artist here chose to show an installation from the Pew series.

Glavkos Koumides, Exhibition View, Iota Daseia, 1999.
Glavkos Koumides, Exhibition View, Iota Daseia, 1999.
Glavkos Koumides, Exhibition View, Iota Daseia, 1999.
Glavkos Koumides, Exhibition View, Iota Daseia, 1999.

Artist(s)

Glafkos Koumides

Glafkos Koumides (b. 1950, Nicosia) lives and works in Germany and Cyprus. He studied architecture in London at AA School of Architecture, 1969-1974 and psychology in Germany at University of Cologne, 1979-1983. He has presenetd his work in many solo and group exhibitions in Cyprus and abroad amongst which Change of Climate, Nicosia / Glavkos Koumoudes, Apocalypse Gallery, Nicosia (2009), The Grand Atelier, Europalia, Brussels / Salient Essence, Nicosia Municipal Arts Centre (2008), Historiophania, Gloria Gallery, Nicosia (2004), Off-Season, Argo Gallery, Nicosia (2002), lota Dasia, Pews, Diaspro Art Centre, Nicosia (1988), Gloria Gallery, Nicosia (1984). Koumides represented Cyprus at the 48th Venice Biennale of Art.

Curator

Eleni Nikita
Born in Nicosia. She studied Social Sciences at the University of Geneva. She is a Ph.D. of the University of Athens in the history of Art. She worked at the Center for Social Research (1971-1977) and in the Cultural Services of the Ministry of Education and Culture (1977-2009), which she served as director from 2003 to 2009. She was for many years the representative of the Ministry of Education and Culture in the Committee on Culture the Council of Europe and various committees of the European Union. He was also Secretary General of the Cyprus National Committee of UNESCO from 2001 to 2009. He is the author of many studies, works of art criticisms and books on modern art. Her book “Christoforos Savvas, the beginning of a new era in Cypriot art”, was honored with the 2009 State Prize of Literature in the essay-research class. He was honored by the French government with the Order of the Knight of the Order of the Academic Phoenix and by the Austrian government with the Honorable Cross for Arts and Sciences. She is a member of the International Association of Art Critics (AICA) and the Society of Historic Art of Greece. Since 2012 she has been working with the Leventis Art Gallery as a curator of the Cypriot collection of the LA Leventis Foundation.

location

Arsenale (Tese Cinquecentesche dell’ Arsenale)