GEORGE SFOUGARAS ARTWORKS

VENUS AND MARS ACRYLIC ON CANVAS 100x100 cm The title of this painting, ' Venus and Mars'  is based on an old and much-explored theme in art.  Two notable examples  can be seen in    Botticelli 's  and   Titian 's interpretations. In fact, art history abounds with images from antiquity to the present day.  The story of the love affair between Venus and Mars and the ensnaring of the lovers by Vulcan was originally the starting point for this painting.  The setting is quite dreamlike and the two protagonists (three if you count the statue of  Zeus as Poseidon ) are shown as disconnected or alienated within the controlled and self-contained room.  In this dreamlike, almost virtual space, the eternal lovers are completely isolated from each other. The male figure, somewhat over-embellished with the wings of a messenger and  by inference endowed with the power of flight, contrasts with the slight and ordi...

‘This World’ Oil on board  60x70 cm This painting was inspired by a hard to authenticate and still disputed Leonardo Da Vinci painting.  I was fascinated by the mastery of depicting the face so beautifully, with hardly any detail. I thought it would be simple to copy.  I was wrong. Da Vinci, or whoever was imitating him, had created something that was truly magnificent with chalks and inks on vellum. Subtle and understated, it showed a young woman (The Young Fiancée) on a flat background, with the predominant colour being gold.  The original is a small and humble painting at first glance, but the wonder of it really emerged for me as I tried to copy some of the magic. After many days of reworking, I realised that this was taking its own direction. I painted the landscape in the background to balance the figure and create a sense of space. The original had a flat golden background.  The flower which in our modern times is just a flower,...

'MERLIN' OIL ON CANVAS 2015 PHYSICAL DIMENSIONS: 40X80 cm Most heroes are shown as young and physically powerful. We worship beauty and strength and of course, youth. This work pre-dates the 'Wisdom of Old Age' Acrylic portrait. In this painting I wanted to challenge the perception that old age is unattractive; that ageing signals a loss of potential. I wanted to reassert that old age brought with it life experience, knowledge and of course wisdom. The figure of above and the title 'Merlin' suggest a sense of mystical strength.  The face is intelligent, kind, knowledgeable and intelligent.  As a mythological character, the image of magician equates with the ability to resolve impossible situations. What greater power can there exist? Suddenly brute strength assumes a less significant place in the scheme of things. In some therapeutic settings clients are sometimes advised to visualise a wise figure that they can engage in an inner dialog...

ART AND EMOTIONAL WELLBEING THE FEZ There comes a moment in our lives, when we start to not only think of who we are.  We begin to ask questions about our past, about the people that helped us and the people that lived long before we came into existence.  It is not a linear process.  We meander and seek, we find out, or not.  Sometimes our search takes us down dead ends.  In my case, there are major issues in trying to find simple facts about my family tree.  I can no longer find out anything about the family from any living member, and prior to my grandparents on both sides, there simply is nothing. It is sometimes hard to explain to people that most of our records and my grandparents' lives were lost or profoundly changed in the case of the latter. The sad part is ( maybe this resonates with others reading this) that when my father was alive, I did not take full advantage of his knowledge and his memories.  He spoke softly of his chi...

A RT AND EMOTIONAL WELLBEING  'The impulse to keep to yourself what you have learned', writes  Annie Dillard , 'is not only shameful, it is destructive. Anything you do not give freely and abundantly becomes lost to you.  You open your safe and find ashes'. Quoted from 'This Sunrise of Wonder' by Michael Mayne. Chania Harbour. Oil on panel 10x30. G. Sfougaras 2015 'A BEAUTIFUL SONG IN ANOTHER LANGUAGE' It is funny how some important things in our lives happen as a result of accidents.  Of course, it could be argued that these 'accidents' are simply the congruence of experiences.  Whatever the reason for new insights and new ideas, or congruences, I experienced one last week. I went to the central library, to look at the art books.  It was a random act, based more on the fact that I need a variety of experiences and different spaces, now that I am in control of my daily timetable. I picked up a book, an autobiographical book b...

Self-reflection through art:  The gift of old age.... In this painting of an old man, I was exploring the use of acrylic paint to create the appearance and particularly the chiaroscuro effect in an ‘old master’. I was not disappointed with the outcome; it is as they say, what it says it is. Acrylic paints, certainly the way that I have always used them, as less giving than oils. They can have a harshness and lack of translucency and of course, they dry quicker.  The last part, which causes problems for many, is the reason I adopted them as my medium of choice. It is possible to use acrylics to complete several layers of a painting in a day.  I used to think that that was a great advantage and in some ways, of course, it is. This painting and its textural appearance would have taken me days to achieve if I was working in oils. Although this was primarily an exercise in the use of a particular medium, it never-the-less has a story to tell. No painting is with...