And while my own personal universe—since my very birth—has been washed by the seas, somewhere there in the years of my adulthood innocence, there came a wave, both crashing and inexplicable, to sweep me away to the shores of the island of Antiparos.

With this great prefix “Anti” [“opposite” or “oppose”] distinguishing the name of the island, land and sky, light and water captured me from the very first moment in its “always”. A part of my soul will always belong to this place: a place of inspiration, of Neolithic history, of a beauty that chooses you, a summer place for both me and people dear to my heart.

When Mary Chatzaki suggested I participate in the Synopsis Group Exhibition at “anti” Art Gallery, where she is accustomed to presenting her work every year as the final act of her summer travels, I was thrilled. I felt the same as I did when I crossed the threshold of this space just last summer when I had the good fortune to enjoy Christos Bokoros’s paintings—his Panagia  Keriotissa, his jasmine, moons and seascapes—and lose myself in them.

One year later, at the end of this summer, I have the pleasure of resting my works against the same walls, which refuse to forget that painter’s almost eternal light, and bask in the embrace of this womb to present a collection of jewelry crafted from the truth of the nude form. Genesis is the title I chose and the three forms that represent it: the Embryo as the Origin of All Things, Woman and Man as today’s Adam and Eve. It is an ancient idiom, drawn from the memory of the cell, a blend of cultures, a primeval journey of the subconscious. While I was exploring and creating this thematic series, I realized that I was, indeed, standing before a birth whose combinations bring about new givens, harmonious connections and, at the same time, unique equilibria between the masculine and the feminine, like the pieces of a precious puzzle in the making. The conception of the original idea was presented in January 2017 and today, after nine months, the stages of this gestation see the light of day.

With Achilleas Christidis granting us holy light from the nearby island of Despotiko with his soulful works, Yannis Adamakis giving the signal for the ship’s departure to transport us to the island, and Perdita Sinclair sowing her glass seeds in the seabed, here’s wishing for calm seas.

Sofia Zarari
(translated by Thalia Bisticas)