exhibition

In the ruins

Emi Avora

22.Jun.06 - 16.Jul.06
Thu-Sun 12-6 or by appt

Contemporary Art Projects
20 Rivington St
London EC2A 3DU
020 7739 1743
info@caprojects.com
www.caprojects.com
Tube Old Street, Liverpool Street, Shoreditch / Hoxton

Emi Avora’s paintings are based on sketches, drawings, glimpses and a variety of sources, from glossy magazines to film and historical architecture, as well as her own travels (combining an appreciation of the past and curiosity for the future).

Emi Avora is interested in a fusion of the very ordered and the very chaotic. Through an exaggeration of elements and invention of shapes, she tries not only to describe an extravagant, opulent and cinematic realm but also to create dreamlike visions that hover between reality and fiction, between different countries and different centuries.

‘In the ruins’ brings together a number of paintings that are combinations of sourced imagery and invention. The battle between the subject matter and the often exaggerated painterly marks makes a sense of disintegration and ambiguity their dominant characteristic. The spaces look distant or decomposed either emerging out of the multiple layers of translucent oil paint or disappearing in them.

An intense sense of light is of great significance in the works as it acts as a way in or an exit point out of them. It allows suggestions of infinity or describes claustrophobic areas. The palette is very particular, again emerging from a constant disagreement between colours one erasing the other until they finally find their place in the picture.

Through her paintings Emi Avora tries to position the viewer into places of wonder and sometimes anxiety, of otherworldly beauty that borders with decadence, grandeur that sometimes verges onto repulsion.

Emi Avora graduated from The Royal Academy Schools in 2002 with an MA in Fine Art. Her work has shown at the ‘Armory Show’, Greenberg Van Doren gallery, NY and ‘ARCO’, Greenberg Van Doren gallery, Madrid. In 2004, she participated in ‘East End Academy’ at Whitechapel Gallery, London as well as ‘BOC Prize Shortlist Show’ at Space Gallery, London. Emi Avora, born in Greece, currently lives and works in London.