Born in Athens in 1961, she studied Painting at the Athens School of Fine Arts (1979-1986) under Yorghos Mavroidis, Yannis Moralis and Dimitris Mytaras (1979-1986). Marilitsa Vlachaki has illustrated a significant number of books and book covers. Her works can be found in the Kouvoutsakis Art Institute, the Vorres Museum, the National Gallery – Alexander Soutsos Museum, the Hellenic Parliament Gallery and in numerous private collections. She lives and works in Athens.
Marilitsa Vlachaki
Works
On Art and Her Art: Marilitsa Vlachaki
The painter Marilitsa Vlachaki talks about her need to narrate, in her early work, tales of the human condition, and cites the element of fairytale as the stimulus for the birth of an image. She also explains why she is now more engaged with the theme of decline and loss. She expresses the opinion that the gaze of Sotiris Felios, as discerned through his collection, is the very quality of the works he has selected, and brings up the exhibition of the collection held at the Benaki Museum in 2009. Finally, she confesses that when it comes to her erotic works, as well as their preparatory sketches, which date back to the mid-1980s, The Sotiris Felios Collection functions for her as an ark that preserves both her personal and painting history.
Solo Exhibitions
2007
Art Space 24•
Athens•
2006
Tzamia-Krystalla Art Gallery•
Chania•
2004
Nees Morfes Gallery•
Athens•
1997
Nees Morfes Gallery•
Athens•
1993
Art Space 24•
Athens•
1992
Milies•
Pilio•
1992
Ora Art and Cultural Centre•
Athens•
1987
Eleni Koroneou Gallery•
Athens•
2007
Art Space 24•
Athens•
2006
Tzamia-Krystalla Art Gallery•
Chania•
2004
Nees Morfes Gallery•
Athens•
1997
Nees Morfes Gallery•
Athens•
1993
Art Space 24•
Athens•
1992
Milies•
Pilio•
1992
Ora Art and Cultural Centre•
Athens•
1987
Eleni Koroneou Gallery•
Athens•
Press
Nature’s hermetic essence, its circularity and uniformity along with the fact that its most hidden and uninterpreted part is probably the human being, do not allow its phenomena to rise to the heights of an aesthetic emotion. Even sweetness and tenderness emitted from the bodies’ joining, do not rise. The main reason for this motionlessness may be the creator’s permanent absence. We do not see his laborious hand.
Marilitsa Vlachaki’s hand touches and probes the same archetypical creation. The one that includes nature and the naked man. All of a sudden, though, this recreation makes us meditate and, above all, transmits a soulful and spiritual kind of shiver. This is partly due to the total lack of affection, more or less as we find it in the light and common popular ways. I don’t know if meditation truly enhances our deep knowledge – though it is true that hopeful souls reach divinity through elevation – but probably this shiver adds to the expression of the face, to the deepness of the look, to the tone of the voice. The imprints that meditation leaves on our face make us worthy of a better communication, reconcile us and unify us – in the trunk that nourishes the countless branches of otherness.
I like to think of these paintings exhibited in public places – not necessarily in galleries and Museums – offering themselves to the eye of the passer-by. Like road signs of a new conciliation between the individual and the social. I wonder what the face of the passer-by will be like in the remote future.
Sotiris Dimitriou