Who’s Koula Savvidou?

We used to joke within the gallery: “Koula Savvidou for President!” when this title meant nothing however two phrases and an infinite sea of enthusiastic emojis on our social media accounts.

Who’s Koula Savvidou?

Sooner or later as I used to be sitting on the large wood dinning-table of Apostolos Georgiou, a small object product of tin caught my consideration. It was one thing between a basic US letterbox and the kind of water faucets they used again within the days to retailer water and wash fingers and face with a small brass faucet that turns and possibly lets the liquid circulate.

It had 4 brief legs that made it seem like a mammal and a small bucket ready to be full of… with what?

Because the grasp of that home shouldn’t be of the accumulating objects sort, I dared ask what’s the goal of this container and who made it?

He says Koula; Koula Savvidou.

Some form of electrical energy went by means of me, channelled wrongly. I used to be left perplexed as to how this title will be related with this important, primal and exquisite factor.

Who’s Koula Savvidou?

I mentioned.

That was three years in the past, and I made certain to get to know who she is and what she does.

Once I travelled to Cyprus I used to be formally launched to her through Christodoulos Panayiotou.

All girls I present, are stunningly trying, and she or he, can also be born a star.

In my first go to at her place, it was not possible to not be indiscrete.

Her condo, situated within the peculiar however extraordinarily acquainted Tower Mansions of Nicosia on Tennedou avenue, is a gesamtkunstwerk; and time has stopped there.

A mix of fluffy trying Artifort cotton upholstered sofas in reds, yellows and blacks, and from the not so excessive ceiling hold low lengthy stringed Artemide lights in Klein blues, matching the window frames; a black lacquered piano (her pedigree is stuffed with music and genius) floats on an off-white carpet.

The entire above, and way more, blended with massive sculptures and pencil drawings framed in thick wood frames and wall items constituted of wire and threads and wooden from completely different many years of her life. An enormous white coral dominates the espresso desk, a proof of affection but additionally of a state in between dream and actuality, life and afterlife, and sculpture. A symphony of completely mixed materials and hues, very soothing to somebody rising up within the 80s within the southern a part of Europe.

Her fortress in isolation, continues to be the place every little thing occurs, in solitude and surrounded by poetry manifesting in inside preparations. And he or she is the lonesome and wandering Queen, with some very particular and uncommon visits.

It’s been a pleasure and an honour to enter her universe.

There may be nothing extra touching and severe than nice artists who make area for all times and are outlined by it and so they flip their genius right into a backdrop for themselves to take care of the on a regular basis.

Koula Savvidou is a type of extraordinary folks, as most nice artists, not less than from this a part of the world normally are; specifically the ladies. Caring and therapeutic have been core parts of her structure, a real alchemist in life and work who has all the time mixed supplies for the sake of fixing riddles and for the sake of stability.

The work she makes is outlined by bringing collectively delicate parts or supplies that produce epic, mythological creatures, if figuration is at stake, or the very reverse; she produces works of excessive sensibility from heavy, sharp and violent objects.

As she is caught between the physique of an unique hen and a water nymph, so is her work.

And if some name it surrealistic, it could not be a mistake.

Whereas bringing disparate and loaded parts collectively, she speaks of myths, historic feminine tales of transformation, motherhood and childbearing but additionally very a lot in regards to the impossibility of a society to recognise, and assigns the artist a accountable medium to catalyse the ‘sensorial frenzy’ of our occasions.

“In a society the place nobody is correctly acknowledged by others, every one turns into unable to acknowledge one’s personal actuality.”

For her first present at Rodeo, Koula Savvidou presents a physique of sculptural works from the interval 1987-2021 alongside some wall items. A lot of the works exhibited right here come from “On the Solitary Crossing of Impassable Passages,” her solo exhibition that befell at Diaspro Artwork Centre in Nicosia in 1995.

Skilled to turn out to be a painter, and practiced in an excellent architect’s studio in France, her language has turn out to be sculpture. She by no means stopped portray, although she doesn’t use canvas any extra, with some exceptions.

Her sculptures are principally all the time drawn with earthy tones, of the land washed by the intense solar mild, the moon and the sunshine of the celebrities.

Savvidou’s metamorphosis happens in isolation and is what provides form to these figures, that stand and look forward to a brand new life. Like refugees in a flight these misplaced souls, our bodies who’re altering pores and skin, identification and at last remodel.

at Rodeo Piraeus, Piraeus
till September 3, 2022

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