Interview with Elysia Athanatos - Excellence Award Larnaca Biennale 2018

Who is artist Elysia Athanatos? Share with us a few things about you and your work in general.

Since a young age I have chosen art as a path. I believe in its magic!

My work is very much connected to me. It is my way of connecting to the world around.

I believe if you are able to get in contact with your deeper self and if you are able to transform an expression of that self, then you are able to connect and help others connect with there deeper self!

My work is not social but I think it is intimate, as it touches something inside the spectator. It has a presence and it becomes a part of who is around it.

My research starts within myself with images and sensations that I then try to analyze and transform into matter. I have a very close, hands on approach to the material I chose to work with. I noticed in time, that I go through long cycles in completing what I am looking for and trying to express. I feel that there is a very subtle line between reaching an idea of an image and between materializing (the feeling of) the essence of that idea. My work is all about trying to transmit that essence.

What was your reaction when you heard that you where awarded?

Of course I was very happy to hear my name in a moment like that!

I felt appreciated and I felt that there was fairness in the way the award winners where chosen! 

Tell us a few words about your awarded work.

For some time now I have been working on a space I call the ‘empty space’. The hollow.

Emptiness is a feeling that brings so much to the surface. It is something felt in such a deep level and is so hard to capture, that it makes it hard to get rid of!

As I was going through this feeling I felt the emotional overload the empty can bring. I was asking myself, if I had to show what this feeling looks like what would I fill this space with.  I felt there was a beauty to be found in the sensation you get from this space.

As time went by I found myself working with clay and working on a wheel. Years went by and I couldn’t get off of the wheel, not even realizing what it was that pulled me there. I built myself experience and reached a level where a vessel is not only perceived as a container of everyday material, but found beauty in the simple fact that it is a container of the hollow.  It is a “form” that it’s outside forms the inside and the inside holds the outside (and vice-versa).  

When I heard about the theme of this Biennial “Container & Content” I thought it was a total match!

I called the presented work “Containing Light”.

An empty space filled by the light it reflects from the inside.

Real gold is used in the inside to bring that light out and for me it is a symbol of the reflection (the beauty) we all have inside of us when we are able to find the light.

 What is your impression about this first Biennial in Cyprus?

I think it is a very good start! I think it brings Cyprus on the map of Art around the world.

Connecting and eliminating boundaries a little island like Cyprus can have! I think the people that have worked in making it happen put their hearts into it and I felt it was done in a pure form.

It was complete as in using and accepting all art forms and I think Larnaca was the perfect place for it.

A message you would like to send to artists that will apply in the future for participation in Larnaca Biennale.

It is worth applying to!