The woman who gave bith to herself

The Woman Who Gave Birth To Herself
a solo show by Irini Karayannopoulou

curated by Delia Gonzalez
Aetopoulos, Perikleous 24, Athens, Greece

Opening: Friday, October 4, 19.00 – 22.00
Duration: October 4 – October 25, 2019

Opening Hours:
Friday 14.00 – 20.00, Saturday 12.00 – 18.00

The Woman Who Gave Birth To Herself is an installation of works on paper by Irini Karayannopoulou. The artist paints directly on selected images re-discovered in the international press. In this body of work, models in outdated fashion editorials obtain new faces and undergo various metamorphoses.

Scale is one of the means the artist uses to enhance the power of her refreshed characters. Multi-level metaphors charged with ideological and political subtext emerge as the artist enlarges these images, charging them with spiritual allure.

The masked muses are no longer objects to look at but also subjects capable of looking at us. In this transformation game, the artist explores the fringes of mainstream culture, via the transfiguration of her protagonists and the deactivation of consumerism.

The Woman Who Gave Birth To Herself, contributes to the blurring of the boundaries between a fashion industry generated sex-appeal, a world of fantasy (the artist’s own) and female empowerment. Irini underlines the everlasting motif of objectifying women while she reflects on society’s expectation of perfection and the pending notion of the ideal.

The army of beauties featured in the exhibition, travel through time and space vis-à-vis each other’s vulnerable and glamorous poses, in newly obtained identities. Model becomes muse becomes icon becomes Goddess, in a staged situation of reappropriation and overturning of preexisting hierarchies.

The ambiguity of these characters determines their expressive power as they fluidly transform from forgotten, superficial, unanimated puppets into powerful, quasi-supernatural women.

As Delia Gonzalez recently stated at the Art issue of Vogue Polska: the work of Irini Karayannopoulou achieves what all works of art aim for: entry into the world of the untouchable. Irini’s sphere is filled with boundless filters that open the passageway to the unconscious universe, where creativity and evolution preside.

The artist dives into a sea of low-brow printed matter and brings to light her own, previously unimaginable creative process of reactivating ready made images as though they actually had a secret, an inner life, waiting to be lived.  We are looking forward to see what comes next.

Sébastien Marteau, Athens 2019