Thousand Julys presents photographs of Nicosia

A new space for contemporary art has opened in Nicosia and is hosting an exhibition by a young local artist. Thousand Julys is housed in a former coffeeshop and aims to be a space to present, discuss and build around current happenings in contemporary art. The venue launched its programme by hosting a solo exhibition by Marietta Mavrokordatou titled Our Misfortune.

On until November 18, this new body of work exhibits Mavrokordatou’s art whose materials are the people closest to her and the city she grew up in, documented while going for a walk.

Within these walks, familiar subjects and familiar backdrops build a fictional narrative. A story that never existed materialises is and documented. Friends become subjects, role models, fashion models, commercialised, adored, perceived and depicted. Public spaces become temporary structures for the new narrative.

In the process of building the narrative, a vocabulary consisting of experiential or personal associations is gathered and then used for the purpose of being ignored, escaped, or re-written. A fictional reality created out of the need to escape a supposed condition; the unbearable heat, the burden of predictability, the generational anxiety. Unavoidably, the new reality is born out of the very things it’s trying to escape, becoming a shinier, sexier, more poetic version of itself. The artist’s material is what surrounds her, what touches her on a daily basis – you can’t become without existing.

Consisting of 24 individual photographs and one collage, the exhibited pieces were taken on a single walk in late July.

Our Misfortune

Solo exhibition by Marietta Mavrokordatou. Until November 18. Thousand Julys, Nicosia. Open by appointment. [email protected]