The Loukia and Michael Zampelas Art Museum
4 Νοεμβρίου 2012
Michael Zampelas, together with his wife, Loukia Zampelas, has been collecting and supporting the work of many Cypriot, Greek and foreign artists for over forty years. The turn of the millennium and the couple’s love for the arts fuelled their desire to promote the work of upcoming as well as established artists, and to bring their work to the public. Hence they founded the company Zampelas Art to make their dream reality.
An open call for a competition to create a catalogue of the 100 best Cypriot artists of the 3rd millennium was the first Zampelas Art venture. Art critics from the UK, Italy, Greece and Cyprus studied 500 submitted works and selected 100 of these for inclusion in the catalogue Cypriot Artists of the 3rd Millennium, which can be found in museum libraries around the world. Zampelas Art also acquired these works.
Zampelas Art set as its primary objective the establishment of a complete Art Centre to promote art and culture in Cyprus and abroad. The company has founded the Loukia and Michael Zampelas Art Museum a non-profit private organisation which makes art accessible to all. The company’s other art-related ventures were created under the brand name Zmart: Zmart Framing, Zmart Gallery, Zmart Shop and Zmart Café. In addition to these initiatives, Zampelas Art created Zmart Education, which offers a range of educational programmes. Finally, the electronic publication of the academic Journal of Arts, as well as numerous other beautiful projects for the progression and spread of art in Cyprus, are still in development.
The Loukia and Michael Zampelas Art Museum showcases modern and contemporary art in Cyprus. Situated in Kaimakli, it is located very close to the centre of Nicosia and the walled city, the cultural hub of the island. Its location is pivotal and signifies another objective of the Museum: the cultural regeneration of Kaimakli and nearby areas, to create a new chapter in the cultural development and history of the island.
Through its guided tours, the Loukia and Michael Zampelas Art Museum offers a unique and unforgettable museum experience. These guided tours, based on the permanent collections and the temporary exhibitions hosted at the Museum, are offered to both adults and children throughout the year. They are led by specialised art historians and tour guides in Greek, English and other languages.
The Founders
Michael and Loukia Zampelas are the creators and founders of the Loukia and Michael Zampelas Art Museum and the driving force behind Zampelas Art. Alongside Michael Zampelas’s professional activities, which include the establishment, presidency and management in Cyprus of the international accounting firm PriceWaterhouseCoopers (formerly Coopers & Lybrand) and his vital contribution to the enhancement of the accounting profession in Cyprus, he has worked tirelessly to promote Cyprus internationally, with particular support for the financial rejuvenation of Cyprus following die Turkish invasion. He served as Mayor of Nicosia from 2002 to 2006 with tireless creativity and extensive social service and, since 1997, has been the Consul General of Estonia in Cyprus.
The Loukia and Michael Zampelas Art Museum reflects the desire of Michael and Loukia Zampelas to contribute to local art and cultural events, to bring art closer to their fellow citizens, and to exhibit the beauty of Cypriot heritage to the wider world, thus creating an “eternal treasure” in Cyprus and abroad.
Museum Inauguration
The Museum opened its doors to the public on 17th May 2012. The first exhibition tested at the Museum was entitled “P. Tetsis – Paintings” and was on display from 17th May until 2nd September 2012.
P. Tetsis – Paintings
By Margarita Kounnafi, Museum Manager
The Museum, in collaboration with the Contemporan Greek Art Institute in Athens, presents a selection of 28 representative works of Panayiotis Tetsis. These 28 works are an excellent sample of the artistic path Tetsis has travelled. Tetsis’s paintings are divided, deliberately or subconsciously, into thematic categories which define his subject matter chronologically. These themes are numerous, representing and defining him according to the touch of his coarse brushstrokes. The works in this exhibition have been selected from the following thematic categories: Friends, Hydra of Tetsis, Sifnos and Bypassing the Tselevinia. More recent artworks have also been selected under the theme The Pines.
Thanks to this presentation, we can see that at a time when painting of the 20th and 21st centuries seems to be less popular as a contemporary European artistic trend, Tetsis simply embraces painting itself. He believes in the simplicity of materials and in frugality. Artistic inquiry through a variety of media (watercolour, oil paint, pastels and charcoal), and the transition from white to black are the core components of his work. Tetsis introduces us to his passion for the familiar, revealing his great love for his native island. Hydra, and for Sifnos, which he considers to be the source of his inspiration and creativity. By studying the landscapes of these two islands at various times of the day and from various angles, lie creates panoramic architectural compositions that capture the Mediterranean landscape in dark blue and strong ochre.
The Tselevinia, grouped in a separate thematic section of their own, are a series of paintings devoted to the uninhabited islands between Poros and Hydra: they symbolize both the union of the lives of the two islands and the separateness of these lives. In the exhibition, the human element is displayed in the thematic section, Friends, which again demonstrates Tetsis’s passion to capture something personal and familiar on his canvas. His aim is not to demonstrate his skills as a painter, but to embody the simplicity of movement and show his love for his friends, who posed for him so patiently. He conveys the energy of movement through his characteristic brushstroke, even though the model remains motionless. Many have called Tetsis die “alchemist of colours”, or even the “hedonist of colours”, but the relationship between black and white plays an essential role in his artistic creation. In particular, a series of black and white landscapes of Sifnos in Indian ink may have contributed to the creation of some of the more recent works presented in this exhibition. The Pines, which forms part of the series of black and white pieces, is the most important thematic section of this exhibition. In Tetsis’s black and white pieces, white doesn’t function simply as a plain background but as part of the composition. In this respect these paintings are similar to etchings, where black and white determine the shade, tone and hue, but with the freedom of the artist’s brushstrokes. The natural aura of the pines, and the diluted oil paint that conveys the texture of the bark of this Mediterranean tree in an abstract space and time, make these paintings true works of art. Panayiotis Tetsis is a modernist, but his work is redolent with the sweet smell of tradition. These two elements come together in the vivid colours and the black and white in his palette, making his canvases open windows onto Sifnos and its pines, onto the Tselevinia, onto his beloved Hydra. Tetsis reveals this magical view lo us. Tetsis – artist, scholar, teacher, as his friends and colleagues call him – has opened the balcony door to his artistic work for us. He gives us a glimpse into his world and lets us make it our own.
Permanent Collections
The permanent collection of the Loukia and Michael Zampelas Art Museum embodies the Museum’s mission, to present and promote Cypriot and foreign contemporary art and culture in Cyprus. The collection includes paintings, sculpture and mixed media by Cypriot artists of the 20th and 21st century and from a small number of Greek artists from the 19th, 20th and 21st centuries.
Education
Apart from its permanent collections, the Loukia and Michacl Zampclas Art Museum hosts different temporary exhibitions throughout the year. The Museum’s Department of Educational Programmes creates original educational programmes, based on the Museum’s permanent collections and various temporary exhibitions, for all school groups, including children with additional support needs. These programmes aspire towards developing the aesthetic understanding of the students and their critical thinking, as well as cultivating their creative abilities and love of art. The topics of the educational programmes are linked lo school curricula and can be used in tandem with lesson plans by individual leaders.
As part of the museum’s educational programmes, children observe works of art and participate in original educational-recreational activities. The programmes are designed to be fun and to help children create and express themselves with the guidance of trained museum educators. Children use a wide range of supervisory materials which helps them understand the particularity of the different themes and techniques artists use. All the students are provided with educational worksheets created for a particular exhibition The duration of each educational programme is 90 minutes.
Art Workshop for Children
Children of all ages can take part in the educational programmes of die museum’s art workshop. With the guidance of framed museum educators, they create their own artworks using a range of art materials. The museum also offers family educational programmes. Parents, together with their children can experiment with different materials and techniques (watercolours, collage, ceramic decoration and more) to make original “family” creations.
Art Workshop for Adults
The Museum’s art workshop offers several ways adults, including aspiring artists, teachers and university students, can spend their free time. Guests are introduced to art materials and techniques, including painting, engraving and sculpture and are shown how to use these techniques in the classroom by established artists. The museum also offers educational programmes especially for adults to promote “lifelong learning”. In this way, anyone who loves any form of art or culture can choose one of the activities on offer and get involved. Organised tours for adults, based on the museum’s permanent collection and temporary exhibitions, are offered throughout the year, as are seminars, workshops and events pertaining to art, philosophy and science.
The Journal of Arts
The Journal of Arts supports the work and builds the profile of the museum. Academic in nature, the journal features academic papers, interviews, artists’ presentations and reviews of events and exhibitions from Cyprus and from around the world. The aim of the magazine is to contribuie to the progress of arts and letters, to promote academic discussions on the arts in Cyprus and to enrich the education of the Cypriot public about the arts and the art world in general. The journal’s coverage is mainly the visual arts, although discussions about art in general will not be excluded. Topics such as “What is art?”. “Is beauty in tire eye of tire beholder?”, “Can art help lo solve life problems’?”. “How can art dramatically influence peoples” education?” and so on are central to the journal.
The first issue of The Journal of Arts was published in lire fall of 2012. The journal is free in electronic formal with annual membership – a print version is available on request for a small fee. The journal is published in English, but some Greek translations will also be available. Submissions in English are preferred but both English and Greek submissions are accepted. The editor of the journal is Melita Panagiota Sidiropoulou. Ms Sidiropoulou is a Doctor of the University of Edinburgh. Her thesis, academic publications and presentations of international scope concern art and aesthetics as well as ethics, philosophy of education and education policy.
Source: Cyprus Today, Volume L, No. 2, April-June 2012, A quarterly cultural review of the Ministry of education and Culture publish and distributed by the Press and Information Office (PIO), Ministry of Interior, Nicosia, Cyprus.
