Place: Museum of Contemporary Art,
Basil & Elise Goulandris Foundation
ANDROS | GREECE
Duration: JUNE 25, 2017-OCTOBER 01,
2017
For the summer of 2017, the Museum
of Contemporary Art of the Basil and Elise Goulandris Foundation is preparing a
tribute to the distinguished poet and painter Nikos Engonopoulos.
Nikos Engonopoulos lived by Horace’s
maxim Ut pictura poesis: “as is painting so is poetry” or, more freely
translated: “Painting and poetry must be based on the same principle”. He was a
painter, a poet, he was also a professor at the National Technical University.
Three inter-related paths – the term career is unfitting in this case – for a
single man, who followed them unceasingly and tirelessly for almost fifty
years. Three areas of activity separated to some extent which, however,
enriched one another thanks to a prevailing common denominator: Engonopoulos’
immense, diverse and insatiable - over time – broad and wide-ranging education.
The aim of this dedicated exhibition
is to highlight this manifold activity and the undisputed talent he
demonstrated in everything he became involved. In a museum setting of course,
the facet of the painter inevitably prevails without however overshadowing the
side of the poet and the professor. There is so much one can say about the role
of the painter alone... The painter who is as afraid of the black hole as the
writer is of the blank page, as he described very well himself:
“The painter handles colours and
brushes, oil, white spirit and others. But he knows that behind the canvas
there is a terrible, deep black hole. He moves the canvas aside, with the
boldness of a dream, and leaning into the dark abyss he sees far, far away,
near the bottom, something glowing faintly. At the same time -silently- black
birds, winged fish and ghosts are flying. He comes back to the light. Between
him and the canvas is now a beast. But still he is not afraid”.
Contact details
Hora , Andros, Greece 845 00
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