I recently curated the group exhibit “Rites of the Earth” at the Bank Building Studios & Gallery in Greenville, South Carolina. The exhibit features the work of myself alongside, Greenville-based artist Jess Stone and Toronto-based artist Heidi Keyes.
Check out this segment from our recent artist talk where I speak about the process behind my new series of works titled “Tempest” and the connection to water. And check out the link below to view the full artist talk.
Working with the canvas flat on a table or on the floor, I pour water onto the canvas directly from a jar. Blending with dense layers of textured acrylic paint and more translucent washes of ink and acrylic, the water becomes a medium, the jar a tool, like paint on the brush, I apply water with intention and allow myself to surrender to its movement and shape. This process becomes a “rite”, a “ceremony”, a cleansing as well as a release, exploring my connection with the Earth in ways that may evoke both calamity or calm.
In these paintings, I'm having a dialogue with German Romantic landscape painting, the artist facing the landscape, experiencing the sublime, both beauty and terror in the same moment. When in Italy, I remember seeing a small jar the ancient Romans carried around their necks to catch tears that would fall. I make the connection with the jar pouring water onto the canvas to the small tear jars from Ancient times. I'm exploring water and it's connection to the body, the water pouring from the jar onto the canvas becomes a metaphor, tears from myself, the Earth, the sea, the rain, the rivers, the atmosphere itself.
I invite the viewer into the dance, an internalization of the pulses that lie beneath the Earth, inside of the Earth, becoming us, coming through us.-Fotini Christophillis, 2024
Segment from “Rites of the Earth” Artist Talk featuring the work of Fotini Christophillis, Heidi Keyes and Jess Stone at the Bank Building Studio and Gallery in Greenville, South Carolina.
