PRESS RELEASE
Ilias Papailiakis
A port in the desert
Opening: Thursday 12th September 2024, 19:30-21:30
Duration: 12th September – 12th October 2024
Skoufa Gallery presents Ilias Papailiakis’ new solo exhibition titled A port in the desert which opens on Thursday 12th September 2024, at 19:30 and will run until the 12th October 2024.
During the spring in 2024, while discussing about my forthcoming exhibition at Skoufa Gallery, Yannis Kalligas asked me to read an orphic sign. This sign is engraved on a gold spring, which was found in Farsala (Thessaly) inside a copper hydria that is dated around the 4th c BC. It belongs to a category of orphic signs with eschatological content, found not only in mainland Greece, but also in Magna Grecia and in Rome. These signs were written in dactylic hexameter and are named ‘books of the dead’, a form of passport for the journey to the underworld, a certificate for the dead proving that he belongs to a group of chosen and initiated. With these signs, someone familiar with the underworld, reveals to the departing soul what it will encounter, what to say and what to do or not do during this trip.
“On the right of Hades’ palaces, you will come across a water fountain and near it, there is a white cypress tree; do not approach this fountain; further away, you will find the cold water of Mnemosyne, running from a lake, secured by guards who will ask you why you are heading there; tell them the truth, the whole truth; tell them I am the child of Earth and the starlit Sky, my name is Asterios; I am thirsty; give me water from the fountain to drink”.
Immediately, I imagined a place, non- existent geographically, rich in everyday life, with stories and legends worth living and remembering. To phrase it differently, I wondered what Mnemosyne, the personification of memory, and, mother of the muses, keeps alive in a departed’s soul.
I invented a place and I painted some scenes of its daily life. The Horses of the Sun, The Diver, The Stonemason and the Diver, The Farrier, The Three Musicians, The Dawn, The Days of Love, The Torments of Love, The Sun Dial, The Pilgrim, The One Who Stole the Clouds, Directions and Usages, The Transportation of the Self, are some of the titles of my paintings. I aimed to express what is of capital importance today, while facing an afterlife.
