10 Years of Artists' Books
at the Moufflon Bookshop Nicosia

EXHIBITIONS FROM APRIL - DECEMBER 2005

FERENCZI'S THEORY

Moufflon Bookshop
December 2004 - February 2005

Kyrrillos Sarris
A Maroon's Diary
(Artists books, paintings)
- previous exhibition -

Yannis Michaelides
All Arround the Lake
(artists book, photography)

Vicky Betsou - George Harvalias
Seascape
(Video)

Exhibition of an Artist's Book by Anne Glynnis Fawkes

September 2004    9:00 a.m. - 7:00 p.m.

"Alambrama", an accordion-shaped book (31x210cm) in watercolour, showing a view east from the hill above Alambra village, towards the small smelting site of Almyras.

Glynnis Fawkes is known to many archaeologists working in Cyprus for her accurate archaeological drawings, particularly the drawing of ancient artefacts. But she is principally a painter, with sensitivity for colour and a romantic attitude in the rendering of Cypriot landscape. Her association with archaeology and history of art is obvious in her work. She knows the monuments in Greece and Italy and through her academic studies, particularly her honours thesis "Satyrs and Maenads on Attic Archaic Red Figure Vases" helped her to acquaint herself with the styles but also the spirit of Greek art Had she lived in 5th century BC in Athens I am sure she would have painted vases next to Andokides and Euphronios Those who have seen her drawings will know why. She combines accuracy with simplicity and above all a fine sense of humour. (Vassos Karageorghis)  

"My work may follow in !he tradition of the 19th century artist-travellers (Edward Lear in Greece. David Roberts in Palestine, Edmond Duthoit in Cyprus, among many others). Artists produced collections of drawings and watercolours of the historic sites they visited, m some cases to be reproduced as etchings and sold in their home countries as souvenirs of the lands made famous in antiquity Photography and the easy reproduction of pictures on postcards or in guidebooks have done away with the demand for artists as the primary recorders of historical sites and the landscape

Working at the beginning of the 21st century. I use photography to capture the sites and paint from my photos, which allows me to work for many hours on a painting of a site with a single angle of light and to articulate the abstract details of the stones. For many of these paintings I have worked not from a single photo, but from several photos attached together to expand the narrow frame of the camera's lens into a panoramic view. While the earlier artists were after a pre-photographic verity (if coloured by an earnest colonial or romanticised vision) so that they often posed natives in costume among the ruins, my impulse is to populate the rums as they are today with the material objects from the sites." (Anne Glynis Fawkes)

Contact us or the author (glynnisfawkes@yahoo.com) for further information on the artist's works and publications.

Arts by Glyn Hughes

Glynnis Fawkes’ Alambrama Moufflon

THE exhibition of an Artist's Book - Alambrama, by Glynnis Fawkes - has opened at Moufflon, This is an accordion-shaped book(31x210cm) in watercolour. Showing a view east from the hill above Almyras. Towards the small smelting site of Almyras. Glynnis's exhibition continues until December 4. Hours of opening are 9.30-6.30. The archaeologist/artist says of her work: "It may follow in the tradition of the 19th century artist-travellers (Edward Lear in Greece, David Roberts in Palestine, Edmond Dutoit, in Cyprus, among others)". Artists produced collections of drawings and watercolours of the historic sites they visited, in some cases to be reproduced as etchings and sold in their home countries as souvenirs of the lands made famous in antiquity. A photography and the easy reproductions of pictures on postcards or in guidebooks have done away with the demand for artists as the primary recorders on historical sites and the landscapes.

Coming Events - The Cyprus Weekly, November 19-25, 2004

Greg Deftereos

Exhibition at Moufflon Bookshop, July 12 - August 31

'Long Division - Moments' - C Type Photographs 2003

and

'No 1 Markos Drakos St., Larnaca1 - DVD 90mins. 2000 - 2001

Biographical note: Greg Deftereos is a Melbourne-based artist/photographer who has held a number of international solo and group exhibitions. These include 'Oblique Shadows', an exhibition of contemporary sculpture in Singapore (2000-2001), 'Do Humans Dream in Negative Strips' (1997), a group exhibition at CCP Melbourne exploring the relationship between photography, memory and identity, and '16 Minutes' at Cyprus House Athens (1999).

He has held a number of solo exhibitions exploring similar themes, such as 'A Certain Simile/Smile' at VCA Gallery, Melbourne, (2002), and 'Your Own Personal Mundaneum' (2001) at CCP. Currently, he is involved with creating a series of 'globe' sculptures, collectively titled 'Kiss or Compulsions Like Gravity' - the subject of his work first exhibited in Singapore (2000).

For further information, please contact the Bookshop. If want to talk to or interview the artist, you may reach him on 99177514 or at felixdeft@hotmail.com

'THE IMPOSSIBLE LANDSCAPE' 

EXHIBITION OF ARTIST'S BOOKS

YOU ARE INVITED TO MEET THE ARTIST K Y R I L L O S   S A R R I S  

at Moufflon Bookshop   1 Sofoulis street , wednesday 19th  May   7:00 - 9:00 ; refreshments

THE IMPOSSIBLE LANDSCAPE   [ 1964 - ] is an installation  for ' The Wall ' at Moufflon Bookshop.

It is an  attempt to answer the question whether painting landscape in the open is currently acceptable.

It is also an attempt to overcome the real  and impossible conditions of painting the mountain of St Hilarion .

 " CULTURE IS A PERSONAL MATTER FOR EACH ONE OF US "

              " CIVILIZATION IS A PRIVATE VENTURE "

                   Kyrillos Sarris

 Extracts from articles written by the Art Critic 
Alexandra Koroxenidis
Kathimerini English edition 2001/ 2004 

" Kyrillos Sarris, a Cypriot born contemporary artist is a rather distintive presence in the art world. 
  A medical doctor as well as a practicing artist, he is an intellectual who is deeply knowledgeable about art issues "

 " In his artists books, Sarris uses texts about art, or excerpts from literature that give an idea of the
   interplay between form and content "

 " His work also addresses the tension between looking and reading, use and display, the private and
   the public.... he draws attention to
   the different ways of experiencing art "

 " In Sarris's work, the process by which we perceive is more important than the artwork itself '

 " Just as books mean nothing unless one takes the time to read them, art is not something to be        
    passively looked at but to be decoded and discovered through personal initiative."

 The exhibition remains till the 30th June.

Opening  hours  9:30    [shop hours]   

April 2004

Unfolding Territories:

Two Pairs of Tapestries Each 21.5 cm x 29.5 cm Wool and Silk weft on a linen warp

1) I shared a blanket at night with Millie's little girl Rose 

2) Net 

3) Matthias' mother Nellie stood and chanted in a loud voice a song about going away 

4) Omphalos

Text and textile have a close relationship through their origin in the Latin word 'texere' to weave. To weave a thread and draw out a story may be part of the same process.

These form page-sized tapestries, woven on a loom in linen, wool and silk, refer to the intertwining of pattern and hand writing as marks of communication. The writing comes from diaries written by me while working on an Aboriginal community in the Tiwi Islands in Northern Australia. The texts are placed beside patterns derived from very early Cypriot reprsentations of textiles found on stone and terracotta figurines.

In the Tiwi Islands 'literature' is part of an oval tradition where spoken and sung ceremonies accompany the making of vivid visual patterning.

Εδάφη που ξεδιπλώνονται

Δύο ζευγάρια υφαντά, 21.5 εκ. x 29.5 εκ. το καθένα. Υφάδι από μαλλί και μετάξι πάνω σε λινό στιμόνι.  

1)      Μοιράστηκα τη νύκτα μια κουβέρτα με τη Ρόουζ, το κοριτσάκι της Μίλλυ

2)      Δίκτυ

3)      Η Νέλλη, η μητέρα του Ματία, στάθηκε και τραγούδησε με δυνατή φωνή ένα τραγούδι για τον αποχωρισμό

4)      Ομφαλός

Κείμενο (text) και ύφασμα (textile) είναι στενά συνδεδεμένα μέσ’ από την ετυμολογία τους από τη λατινική λέξη ‘texere’ που σημαίνει υφαίνω. Το να υφαίνεις μια κλωστή και να ξετυλίγεις μια ιστορία αποτελεί ίσως μέρος της ίδιας διαδικασίας.

Τα τέσσερα αυτά υφαντά, στο μέγεθος μιας σελίδας και φτιαγμένα στον αργαλειό από λινό, μαλλί και μετάξι, κάνουν αναφορά στο πλέξιμο μοτίβου και χειρόγραφου σαν σημείο επικοινωνίας.

Τα γραφτά είναι δικά μου, από ημερολόγια που έγραψα ενώ δούλευα με μια κοινότητα Αυστραλών ιθαγενών στα νησιά Tiwi στη Βόρεια Αυστραλία. Τα κείμενα είναι τοποθετημένα δίπλα από μοτίβα πρώϊμων κυπριακών απεικονίσεων υφασμάτων σε πέτρα και πήλινα αγαλματίδια.

Exhibition of Artists' Books

January 2nd - March 31st 2003

WEPRODUCTIONS imprint was established by TELFER STOKES in 1971 and  joined by  HELEN DOUGLAS in 1974. In 1976 it moved from London  to Deucher Mill,  Scotland, where a printing press was set up in 1979.  

WEPRODUCTIONS publications are a paradigm of  a generation of artists’  books characterised by  unlimited editions paperback format  & offset printing. Produced  by Telfer Stokes  & Helen Douglas, the publications demonstrate an exploration of book form to structure visual narrative.  

The PAPERBACK  series published between 1972 – 1978 constitute early and original works in   the development of the genre Artists; Books/ Book Art.  Locating the book as structured place with the use of photography,  the artists investigate imagery in relation to the page and the book format to develop new ways of reading.  Primarily visual with embodied texts the books construct time-based and specialised narratives with the sequencing of pages.

Passage Telfer Stokes   1972   two halves of a sandwich are spread to be constantly pried open & jammed shut again.  Foolscrap  Telfer Stokes   1973 mustard seeds tale root and grow through the front and back of the pages  Spaces  Telfer  Stokes  1974  Loophole  Helen Douglas & Telfer Stokes   1975   Chinese Whispers  Helen Douglas & Telfer Stokes  1975. A corner cupboard is constructed  to the proportions of the open book to become both represented and literal space of the opening.  Within this space words and phrases are given object status as the means of integrating text and image and developing the narrative thread.

The MILLBOARD series of five books published between 1979–1987 demonstrates a widening vocabulary in book art, particularly  in  the innovative combination of text & image.

Back to Back   Telfer Stokes   1980  The first book to be printed,  exploring the boldness of black on the letterpress. Signatures of sixteen pages are used to explore visual narrative in elation to both the central double spread and the single pages to either side of it: on the left leading up to the centre and on the right away from the centre. In addition, the first and last page of each signature provides the place for text which serves to link the story from one signature to the next. The movement in the story is from the fireside kitchen stove – the inside – to the outside, along sheep  tracks to the hills and then back again by stream, river to lake. Young Masters and Misses  Telfer Stokes   1984  Several modes of story telling, relating to different layers of time. The photorealism of the imposed objects that sit on the pages as illusionistic windows, suggest the present or the present now past. Commissioned by Riva Castleman, it is one of a series published by the Museum of Modern Art, New York. Spin Off  Telfer Stokes & Helen Douglas   1985  Splicing and overlay of imagery and print made possible through the artists’ hands on access to the offset reprographic process A visual narrative built up in sequence through the device of car windscreen wipers, which when wiped enable the viewer to see the road and the developing events in the book ahead. On collision with a motorcyclist, everything turns upside down and leads to a new sense of time and space floating loose.  Mim   Telfer Stokes & Helen Douglas   1986  Similar process as Spin Off. Printed flock wallpaper cover. Mim develops different aspects reading on the subject of mimicry, in the image,  a model whose clothing in various way mimics the background she is posed against- the discursive text whose column formation works spatially in relation to the image and the different papers both in texture and colour that this book is printed on.  Real Fiction An inquiry into the Bookeresque   Telfer Stokes & Helen Douglas 1987 Taking as a starting point the incongruous space and shadows made by the open pages of the book, the process of opening or ‘entering’ is explored as one would an unknown dwelling. This process of exploration develops into the construction of a room within the book and then leads from the core of this interior place outwards, as a fusion between inside and outside.  Interspersed, a text hovers and casts shadows on the open pages as an active commentary and associative dialogue on the ‘construction’. Published by the Visual Studies Workshop, in Rochester New York in conjunction with Weproduction.

CLINKSCALE Helen Douglas  & Telfer Stokes 1977

An accordion Strip book. The front and back covers of this book correspond with the front and back of an accordion with the hands playing. Within the bellows of pages is a field of spring grass that rhythmically unfolds in all its glory.

Stells are stone enclosures built for herding sheep in the Lowland hills of Scotland. Their simplicity and subtle differences, created by then different location of each Stell within the land, is portrayed in this sequence of images.

The RED SQUARE series  What started as series of red & square sized books now loosely refers to the books produced between 1989 & 1998. The development has been to a fuller use of layered colour on the one hand & a calligraphic use of line on the other. Movement as a theme of momentum is explored in travel & in dance.

Desire  Telfer Stokes   1989   A densely beautiful maze of memories faces and words. All the parts that make it up, the snatches of conversation, the stolen shoes, an eye, an ear, a mouth, the intense saturated colour, are held in place by a grid of fencing wire. Images and text printed in colour and overlaid colour throughout. Published by Nexus Press USA in conjunction with Weproductions.   Ajar  A History of Burnt Pans  Telfer Stokes & Vsevolod Nekrasov  1991   A ravishing series of visual dishes have been served up for our delectation  varying form the raw to the overdone the verse providing the cutlery for this feast. The text by the Russian poet collaborator plays a role more like the guy ropes and pegs that keep a tent erect and fixed in one place. Printed in colour and overlaid colour. Text in Russian and English. Yarrow Cooks Helen Douglas & Telfer Stokes  1992  Conceived as a fundraiser for Yarrow Primary School,  the cookery book combines beautiful drawings and culinary equipment and edible delights made by school children with recipes from Yarrow Valley community. Water on the Border  Helen Douglas & Telfer Stokes  1994  Direct connections are established between Scotland and China by combining vigorous pen and ink drawings by school children from both countries with reflective image photographically traced from the water surfaces of Yarrow Water, Scotland  and West Lake, Hangzhou, China. In addition six Chinese poems rendered in calligraphy are transcribed from Chinese with inspiration drawn from T’ai Chi and the Su Causeway, Hangzhou to create a continuum and evoke the confluence between water and the water’s edge.

Between the Two    Helen Douglas   1997  This bookwork is constructed to unravel across the open spread and around the edge of the page to express one continuous visual narrative. It begins with sparse photographic renderings of grasses as black line on white, progresses into a softer tonal sequence embodying flight and finally, in the latter part of the book, develops an arabesque dance of tendrical peas, as light on dark, leading to a flowering of the book. Black and white throughout, the book is bound in scarlet crushed velvet.

Song of the Thrush   Telfer Stokes 1998   It was conceived during Stokes’s first visit to Bombay.  ‘ A great deal of what I found there had a strange familiar feel to it, which I let myself be immersed in’ Song of the Thrush develops a visual/tactile quality to express a range of feelings from humour to pathos to anger.  As a prelude, a slow introduction is made through a series of images and titles that are commentaries on each other.  This in turn leads to the Song where the images worked and colour become an interwoven dialogue. 

Wild Wood  Helen Douglas  1999  It has been conceived as a Border Ballad and takes as its inspiration the Carrifran Wildwood project & the ancient woods at Deucher & Tinnis Stiel in Yarrow. Opening the book and turning the pages is analogous to entering and exploring the Wild Wood where different moods and feelings move the viewer trough the visual narrative.

Become Telfer Stokes & Luay Al Khatib [translator] 2000 The message is of hope and optimism that the beginning of every day, dawn, is a potent reminder of renewal which I see as spiritual awareness. This potential hovers in the early section of this book and then flows into full colour as the rhythm of the song that is sung by the reader takes shape.  This book has been made to be performed using the letters of the words as notes which are placed on the page to correspond to their pitch.

Unravelling the Ripple   Helen  Douglas paperback   2001  A portrait of a Hebridean island tideline unfolds as a single photographic image flowing through the textures and rhythms of sand wrack and wave.  With an essay by Rebecca Solnit. This book could be bound as a circle, the pages like the spokes on a wheel  a turning investigation of the sea, a continuity that folds back on itself, a walk that went all the way around an island to end at its beginning… The sea that always seems like a metaphor but one that is always moving, can not be fixed, like a heart that is like a tongue that is like a mystery that is like a story that is like a border that is like something altogether different and like everything at once the treasure that always runs through your fingers and never runs out. 

Last Day in Kas   Helen Douglas 2001    Last Day in Kas gathers the temporal and particular within the poignancy of a last day. As a form of distilled life, the book is linked through a sideways looking and walking. Places of delineated boundary and shifting ambiguity between display and protection, attraction and rebuff are negotiated through a light, touching and yielding eye. The hand as expression of primary intelligence and articulation is evoked in handwrought ironwork, tangible objects, tended flowers and touchable textures. With the turning of pages and dappled interplay between image, print and paper the reader’s eye and hand are actively engaged in this giving and receiving to ponder the meaning of gift.

8 Minutes  Telfer Stokes 2002        8 minutes refers to the time it takes the light from the sun to reach the earth. Sunlight is exposure. Looking in certain qualities of light at the manmade , human feelings & emotions are discovered embodied in the structures and edifices we construct and inhabit and that we continue to use and re-use.