Angelos (Panayiotou)
Artist bio
Angelos Panayiotou was born in Farkadona, Trikala and studied painting in the Athens School of Fine Arts under the master J. Mavroides. His painting is anthropocentric and realistic in style with themes mainly focused on the human form and nature morts. A lover of spiritual beauty, Angelos succeeds in bringing images, ideas and shapes of a better world before our eyes.
Artist statement
What is art? That which is imposed by the conditions of an ill era or our personal beliefs?
Today, at a time of vast environmental changes and loss, everyone is in search of organic food and avoids the artificially processed and modified aliments, out of fear regarding their known and unknown side effects. Why don’t we do the same with the modified values which evoke even greater side effects within our very core? What is greater in life than to find equilibrium in world that stumbles toward an indiscernible destination? Given the fast pace of our contemporary world, we shall soon be transformed into neurotic creatures and once we meet a normal human, we will regard him as a parasite.
Humans have lost touch with natural reality. They feel like financial derivatives, always striving to achieve a good price of social statue. The same happens in art. The spiritual person has become a financial value with the added anxiety of commercial success. How did we reach this point? Running aloof within an absurd world, for which we are being warned by scientists and sociologists that its end is nigh, no one believes them though. When the end comes, to whom will responsibility be attributed while all of us are mutated into irresponsible beings?
Today a repulsive smell lingers in the air. It is the smell of a deteriorating civilization that is being created upon everyones tolerance. If humans continue the contemporary path, there is no future for lack of intertemporal values. This path is based on fashion and fashion will never cover our deepest needs, those that connect us with each other and the natural environment.
If art truly wants to serve man, let it be based upon established values, like the ones born out of thousands of years of human activity. If we base ourselves upon the values of those that never understood why they came in life, then as a contemporary philosopher remarks, “we will lose all our battles to the benefit of the dark side of contemporary civilization”.
text by Angelos (Panayiotou)