Steven Antonakos work Remembrance will be part of the group exhibition Its empties, it fills, the light at the Β. & M. Theocharakis Foundation, from November 20th, 2024 to Febraury 16th, 2025.

The artists participating in the exhibition, through installations, painting, sculpture, and photography, explore the conceptual references of light—from its metaphysical dimension to its plastic qualities, as well as its everyday presence—from the 1960s to today.

The exhibition offers a unique opportunity to understand how light transforms from a natural phenomenon into a medium of artistic practice. At the same time, it honors the timeless influence of artists such as Takis, Antonakos, Chryssa, Bouteas, Lappas, as well as Apostolou, Gerasimos, Efeoglou, Karakostanoglou, Kontis, Laskari, Nikolakopoulos, Patsourakis, Sagonas, Touliatos, Charitonidis, and Hasapis.

From antiquity to the present day, the sun has captivated creators. Since the early 1960s, neon light has emerged as an expressive medium for many artists across America and Europe. Figures such as James Rosenquist, Robert Walls, Victor Vasarely, Lucio Fontana, James Turrell, Robert Irwin, Doug Wheeler, and Dan Flavin, among others, have shaped the identity of contemporary art with their distinct styles and continuous transformations.

As Takis Mavrotas notes in the exhibition catalogue: "Light remains the unparalleled cause and inspiration of art, as the visual artist continues to make the invisible visible and the intangible perceptible, revealing their vision."

“When light empties and fills again," a phrase often repeated by Panos Giannikopoulos during the preparation of this thematic exhibition, encapsulates the meeting point of established and emerging artists. This intersection prioritizes the expressive power of light—natural or artificial—offering an aesthetic journey into the possible or the impossible.

Exhibition Curators: Takis Mavrotas, Panos Giannikopoulos
Production Management: Marina Miliou Theocharaki

Stephen Antonakos, Remembrance, 1987-1989, installation. The work consists of four parts: Untitled (for my brother Bill) , Neon, aluminium foil on wood, 91.44x91.44x10.16 cm. Untitled (for my brother Tony), Neon, gold foil on wood, 91.44x91.44x10.16 cm. Untitled (for my brother Peter), Neon, gold foil on wood , 91.44x91.44x10.16 cm. Untitled (for my sister Kanella), Neon, aluminium foil on wood, 91.44x91.44x10.16 cm.

Tuesday/August 10/2021 by Nikos Podias is presented as part of FRONTPAGE at the Limassol Municipal University Library, from November 20th to November 29th, 2024.

The Department of Fine Arts at the School of Fine and Applied Arts of Cyprus University of Technology (CUT) develops and organises the second part of the international investigative project FRONTPAGE in collaboration with the European Communication Institute (ECI), in partnership with the Athenian Macedonian News Agency (AMNA) and the open visual arts group AxionArt and the collaboration of the Video Art Festival Miden (Mηδέν). It is supported by various academic institutions, including Donau-Universität Krems (DUK).

The 2nd sequential exhibition of FRONTPAGE project is presented at the Limassol Municipal University Library and wishes to bring in both physical and conceptual proximity, ongoing investigations and negotiations of the cultural relationship of word and image. Through curatorial gestures and relational configurations that involve and develop contemporary interdisciplinary and intermedial formations -between and across multiple fields of knowledge-, the exhibition unfolds within the spaces of the Municipal University Library, taking the form of an expanded art installation.

This installation is conceived under the curatorial intention to examine and negotiate cultural dialectics of what we consider as news, coming from the field of journalism and the event of the news, itself. The event itself, could, therefore, be re-interpreted and potentially re-invented in the Arts. The exhibition is developed as a conceptual and visual choreography throughout the library, where the visitor finds themselves in a new condition of study.

More specifically, the exhibition develops along five main axes: Timeliness - Communication - Image - Word - Memory and will include visual works from already recognized and upcoming visual artists, photographers, photo reporters, and video artists.

The themes developed by the creators have a referential and conceptual approach regarding the transmission of the message, the concept of news, writing, text, and the power of words and images.

The purpose of this project is to achieve an artistic and dynamic outcome through the interaction and collaboration of creators from both the visual arts and the broader fields of journalism and communication. Participants are inspired by front-page newspaper articles they choose and by prominent news from the media, both international and Greek print and digital press. These ‘front pages’ serve as a canvas for creation, commentary, expression, and positioning.

The FRONTPAGE has already been presented at the Melina Mercouri Cultural Center in Athens in 2023, and a new presentation is scheduled in Vienna that involves the participation of creators and communicators from Central Europe’

Eva Marangaki, Visual Artist/Concept/Curator (AXIONART)
Marios Nottas, Director of the European Communication Institute, ECI
Gioula Papadopoulou, Director of the Video Art Festival Miden.
Vicky Pericleous, Assistant Professor | [Ρε:Re] Speculative Fine Art Practices Lab, (CUT)
Andreas Savva Special Teaching Staff, (CUT)
Julia Sysalova, Curator, Art Critic, and Art Communication Educator
Rebecca Taki, Curatorial Assistant, MA Student|MA History and Theory of Art, (CUT)

Production: European Communication Institute E.C.I., AXIONART in partnership with the Athenian Macedonian News Agency (AMNA), AxionArt, Cyprus University of Technology, Festival, Miden

Nikos Podias, Tuesday/August 10/2021, 2023, pencil on paper, drawing, 76x57 cm.