ELIAS KAFOUROS: IMPERSONAL TRAINER
Dio Horia is pleased to announces “Impersonal Trainer“ by the artist Elias Kafourus. The exhibition was partly co-curated by fellow visual artist Dora Economou, who has also authored the text that follows.
June 13 - August 25, 2024
“When Elias asked me if I would like to try writing something about his work, I thought, great, I will work on it as if I’m working on a journey. Even I don’t quite know what i meant by that. You enter a new landscape, like that first dive into the sea, the moment you open your eyes under the water, every time, the nth time, is always like the first time, and the very next moment, it is all those times at the same time.
A sea of signs and references, you throw the dice, you spread the tarot cards, you drop the sticks, or the bones, you read sediments, grounds, the trace of the flame, the signs of the zodiac, call it what you will. You’re grasping at something, Ariadne’s thread, to navigate the labyrinth, to find out what will happen next but also what has already happened. What you’ve seen.
At his studio, I look at Elias’s images and listen to him, listen to us, try not to try to understand, drawing lesson for beginners, you draw what your eye sees, not what your head knows is there, so that another eye can see it too. Of course, what each person sees is a whole other conversation.
His paintings, my folded papers, are inevitably just representatives/representations of the world, but when we do it well, they manage—hopefully—to retain and convey that little bit more that is hidden behind things and when you look at it something happens.
Fortunately, there is Google now, a modern-day Pythia I turn to when I don’t remember much but remember enough to ask the right question, and she tells me: Lou Reed wrote the song inspired by Warhol’s clique, looking at Warhol looking at his world. In Dreamtime, we look at the artist looking at the foire; in the objects in the showcase, we see many Eliases looking at us.
The title of the exhibition: ‘Impersonal Trainer.’ I am not quite sure what it means. Impersonal educator? Intermediary? Middleman? Facilitator? Medium? It’s one of those titles that I feel rather than understand. The phrase ‘Don’t Forget To Breathe’ springs to mind. Good advice in any case, and very rhythmic. I imagine young Elias doing parkour in empty factories in Kaminia.” - Dora Economou, visual artist