REVIEWS AND OPINIONS
YORGOS MARYELIS
1. Through the eyes of a French historian: ILEANA CORNEA
YORGOS MARYELIS
... His paintings offer an imaginative and subjective escape. Their destination is the dream that determines space and time. Enigma replaces certainty and symbols replace speech. Day and night alternate.
A dark night coming through a viscous, dark and sleek painting. From within the ruins of a Venetian palace, a magical atmosphere appears to us. Red, yellow gates… trace a precious architecture.
You can head toward it, without any worries... On the Aegean shores (like the painting “From the Aegean”).
You can feel it, also, with the painting “The Load”. With a scepter in his right hand, a priestly figure, like Neptune dressed as a fisherman, sits in the center of the canvas. In the far left, something vague. Like in the previous painting, the atmosphere is full of calmness....
A night where indolence does not give birth to neither nightmares, nor mystery or melancholy.
The day is always bathed in zenithal light. Smiling and happy, it inspires the artist’s daydreams. Female faces with luscious hair and immaterial appearance form the geometrical synthesis of the painting and, at the same time, represent an idea.
Transparent, in an environment of sweet and light shades, the faces look light and immaterial. They float between curves, as if on waves or Zephyrus’s wings.
Even when the artist whispers in cubic graphism (like in the “Gleaner”) or rayonism (like in “Fairytales on the bench”), he does not use form for the sake of form, neither color for its visual strength.
Slender, byzantine, static, his unrealistic faces take their life from his pencil’s pleasure.
As the seismograph of his dream, Yorgos Maryelis has chosen the lyrical suppleness of his pencil and less the painter’s paste.
With his architectural background, Yorgos Maryelis paints with a steady hand. His sketch is confident. The artist lets his lines slide, making them sensual.
In paintings like the “Couple” or the “Sylphides”, lines end gracefully at a full stop.
In his series “Ink and gouache on paper”, his lines flock in hundreds to form a leg or a moving body (most representative works: “Asian wrestlers” or “Fishermen dancing the Hasapiko”).
This is his strong point.
There are no particular portraits, no personalization is his imagery. Types, Yes.
For example, the horse appears often. Never realistically. Stylized, functioning as a symbol (like in “Ilion”) or, even, as a description or a recording (like in “Genesis”).
This work reminds of Greece, even if someone barely knows the country.
The atmosphere is sweet and calm. There is no agony, nor worry.
The graphic rationalization of the poetic is enough to remind Yorgos Maryelis a piece of mythology.-
Paris, October 2006
Ileana Cornea
Art Historian and Critic
Writer
Collaborates with «Elle à Paris» and «Artension» magazines
2. FRANCIS PARENT
YORGOS MARYELIS
Classification : A330-B180-C150-D100
Classification for Yorgos Maryelis
by the French Art Critic and A.I.CA. member Francis Parent
CLASSIFICATION ANALYSIS
Axis Α: 100 to 600
Α. FORM:
When we look at a work, which are the forms that we can recognize at first glance? Is it more abstract, more symbolic, more… etc. (The scale ranges from the most abstract to the most realistic). It ranges from: Α320 to Α380: Forms
Maryelis Α330: Sweetly pleasant forms:
Typical, material, more sweetly pleasant forms. (Edward Hopper, Balthus, Edouard Pignon, P. Klossowski, Sam Szafran, A. Garcia Lopez, … belong in the Α330 category).
Axis Β: 100 to 300
Β. MATTER:
How is presented the material substance of what we see? (The scale ranges from the most immaterial to the most real). It ranges from: Β130 to Β230: as far as matter is concerned …
In painting, but in relation with all other plastic materials:
Maryelis Β180: mixed matter: structured / non-structured
When a work is “structured” within its “lack of structure” and vice versa (repetitious forms, symbols, materials…). (Viallat, Toroni, Degottex, Hantai... belong in the Β180 category).
Axis C: 100 to 300
C. DEPICTION OF BODY / SPIRIT:
What is the ratio of Body / Sprit that is expressed through the artist’s work? (The scale ranges from the most “intellectual” to the most “natural”, for example from “Spiritual Art” to “Body Art”).
Maryelis C150: Between “Meaning” and “Substance”
Between the material and bodily needs of “Existence” and the multiple questions in regards to “Substance”. (This category [C150] ranges from Münch’s “Scream” to Thomas Hirschhorn’s installations, from Karrel Appel’s “Scream” to Francis Bacon…).
Axis D: 100 to 300
D. COMMUNICATION :
Does the artist want to convey a message through his work? (The scale ranges from the most “spiritual” to the most “social”).
D100 to D120: through the signified
Maryelis D100: the most highly religious expression
This category (D100) ranges from Alfred Manessier’s paintings and Giacomo Manzù’s sculptures to Michel Journiac’s “Liturgies” to Andreas Serrano’s “Piss Christ” or Renée Cox’s “Scenes” …
Francis Parent
Paris 2007
3. The Editor and journalist of Greek Journals HELENA SIAMBOU
HELENA SIAMBOU
Writes for the recent exhibition of
YORGOS MARYELIS
In her preface for the index of works with the general subject
“PERPETUAL SPRING”
Artist Yorgos Maryelis glorifies youth in his most mature collection of paintings and sketches.
Bathed in the bright light of a deeply personal and experiential viewpoint, the artist's work reveals his fervent passion for freedom, beauty, sensuality…
With his poetic, lyrical and profoundly symbolic expression, the painter creates forms born in dreams. Unfading forms that do not succumb under the weight of time, forms that narrate myths of eternal souls.
With the harder, linear, black and white, but equally eloquent language of his sketches, he celebrates the vigor and energy of youthful bodies.
This artistic dualism stresses Yorgos Maryelis’s multisided expressiveness without changing the orientation of his vision: the victory of soul over matter.
Helena Siambou
Journalist
1. Through the eyes of a French historian: ILEANA CORNEA
YORGOS MARYELIS
... His paintings offer an imaginative and subjective escape. Their destination is the dream that determines space and time. Enigma replaces certainty and symbols replace speech. Day and night alternate.
A dark night coming through a viscous, dark and sleek painting. From within the ruins of a Venetian palace, a magical atmosphere appears to us. Red, yellow gates… trace a precious architecture.
You can head toward it, without any worries... On the Aegean shores (like the painting “From the Aegean”).
You can feel it, also, with the painting “The Load”. With a scepter in his right hand, a priestly figure, like Neptune dressed as a fisherman, sits in the center of the canvas. In the far left, something vague. Like in the previous painting, the atmosphere is full of calmness....
A night where indolence does not give birth to neither nightmares, nor mystery or melancholy.
The day is always bathed in zenithal light. Smiling and happy, it inspires the artist’s daydreams. Female faces with luscious hair and immaterial appearance form the geometrical synthesis of the painting and, at the same time, represent an idea.
Transparent, in an environment of sweet and light shades, the faces look light and immaterial. They float between curves, as if on waves or Zephyrus’s wings.
Even when the artist whispers in cubic graphism (like in the “Gleaner”) or rayonism (like in “Fairytales on the bench”), he does not use form for the sake of form, neither color for its visual strength.
Slender, byzantine, static, his unrealistic faces take their life from his pencil’s pleasure.
As the seismograph of his dream, Yorgos Maryelis has chosen the lyrical suppleness of his pencil and less the painter’s paste.
With his architectural background, Yorgos Maryelis paints with a steady hand. His sketch is confident. The artist lets his lines slide, making them sensual.
In paintings like the “Couple” or the “Sylphides”, lines end gracefully at a full stop.
In his series “Ink and gouache on paper”, his lines flock in hundreds to form a leg or a moving body (most representative works: “Asian wrestlers” or “Fishermen dancing the Hasapiko”).
This is his strong point.
There are no particular portraits, no personalization is his imagery. Types, Yes.
For example, the horse appears often. Never realistically. Stylized, functioning as a symbol (like in “Ilion”) or, even, as a description or a recording (like in “Genesis”).
This work reminds of Greece, even if someone barely knows the country.
The atmosphere is sweet and calm. There is no agony, nor worry.
The graphic rationalization of the poetic is enough to remind Yorgos Maryelis a piece of mythology.-
Paris, October 2006
Ileana Cornea
Art Historian and Critic
Writer
Collaborates with «Elle à Paris» and «Artension» magazines
2. FRANCIS PARENT
YORGOS MARYELIS
Classification : A330-B180-C150-D100
Classification for Yorgos Maryelis
by the French Art Critic and A.I.CA. member Francis Parent
CLASSIFICATION ANALYSIS
Axis Α: 100 to 600
Α. FORM:
When we look at a work, which are the forms that we can recognize at first glance? Is it more abstract, more symbolic, more… etc. (The scale ranges from the most abstract to the most realistic). It ranges from: Α320 to Α380: Forms
Maryelis Α330: Sweetly pleasant forms:
Typical, material, more sweetly pleasant forms. (Edward Hopper, Balthus, Edouard Pignon, P. Klossowski, Sam Szafran, A. Garcia Lopez, … belong in the Α330 category).
Axis Β: 100 to 300
Β. MATTER:
How is presented the material substance of what we see? (The scale ranges from the most immaterial to the most real). It ranges from: Β130 to Β230: as far as matter is concerned …
In painting, but in relation with all other plastic materials:
Maryelis Β180: mixed matter: structured / non-structured
When a work is “structured” within its “lack of structure” and vice versa (repetitious forms, symbols, materials…). (Viallat, Toroni, Degottex, Hantai... belong in the Β180 category).
Axis C: 100 to 300
C. DEPICTION OF BODY / SPIRIT:
What is the ratio of Body / Sprit that is expressed through the artist’s work? (The scale ranges from the most “intellectual” to the most “natural”, for example from “Spiritual Art” to “Body Art”).
Maryelis C150: Between “Meaning” and “Substance”
Between the material and bodily needs of “Existence” and the multiple questions in regards to “Substance”. (This category [C150] ranges from Münch’s “Scream” to Thomas Hirschhorn’s installations, from Karrel Appel’s “Scream” to Francis Bacon…).
Axis D: 100 to 300
D. COMMUNICATION :
Does the artist want to convey a message through his work? (The scale ranges from the most “spiritual” to the most “social”).
D100 to D120: through the signified
Maryelis D100: the most highly religious expression
This category (D100) ranges from Alfred Manessier’s paintings and Giacomo Manzù’s sculptures to Michel Journiac’s “Liturgies” to Andreas Serrano’s “Piss Christ” or Renée Cox’s “Scenes” …
Francis Parent
Paris 2007
3. The Editor and journalist of Greek Journals HELENA SIAMBOU
HELENA SIAMBOU
Writes for the recent exhibition of
YORGOS MARYELIS
In her preface for the index of works with the general subject
“PERPETUAL SPRING”
Artist Yorgos Maryelis glorifies youth in his most mature collection of paintings and sketches.
Bathed in the bright light of a deeply personal and experiential viewpoint, the artist's work reveals his fervent passion for freedom, beauty, sensuality…
With his poetic, lyrical and profoundly symbolic expression, the painter creates forms born in dreams. Unfading forms that do not succumb under the weight of time, forms that narrate myths of eternal souls.
With the harder, linear, black and white, but equally eloquent language of his sketches, he celebrates the vigor and energy of youthful bodies.
This artistic dualism stresses Yorgos Maryelis’s multisided expressiveness without changing the orientation of his vision: the victory of soul over matter.
Helena Siambou
Journalist