Defying description -for they are very particular in terms of inspiration, concept and execution- Helene Pavlopoulou's paintings, presented under the title "Ark", mark her ascent on the front line of the contemporary Greek plastic arts field. Though still very young, Helene Pavlopoulou, whose work we had the chance of following from the very start, has managed not only to resist to the Sirens of any -superficial- artistic fashion, but also to strengthen her own unique personality; a personality which gave this important artist the power to impose herself on the international scene as well. And this was achieved on her own merits, since she has never given in trite, well-worn, superficial, in other words globalized, solutions.
From her first works, the landscapes, rendered by means of earthly and other -characteristic of the greek atmosphere- colours (such as blue), the landscapes with the ears of grains and the ploughed land, the boat hulls etc., to her present works focusing both in form and in content on the Ark -compositions that constitute a great offer in the world of art in general- Pavlopoulou has renewed her chromatic palette and the way she experiences her stimuli.
Less representational or, rather, more intensely semi-representational and even abstract, her present works fully express a charismatic borderline between representation and abstraction; a borderline which identifies here with the energy of metaphysics in its most authentic, poetic dimension, Pavlopoulou really succeeds in submitting, according to the purest -Platonic- definition of authentic art, an Idea and identifying its expression with it.
Grouped shapes in constant -through colour and the way the latter is "orchestrated" into the composition- transformation and movement stimulate our imagination, so that it never contents itself with just a prosaic reading and interpretation. Each one of her works, apart from being a challenge not only to her creative instinct but to ours as well, creates both visual and inward experiences.
An ineffable and charismatic spirit characterizes Pavlopoulou's present works, endowing them with a perpetual power which enables them to exist as independent works of art.
These works, on the verge of metaphysics in respect both to their concept and to the painter's reborn palette (with the uncountable hues of red and blue co-existing with the previous earthly ones), constitute a whole atmosphere in the surrounding environment. The concept of space, which is reborn in Pavlopoulou's works through her brilliant, dynamic "orchestration" of the chromatic fields, her idiomatic point of view and the setting of the composition, exudes a true quality of the cosmogony itself.
The very DNA of life and the mysteries of the universe are laid here in a most inspiring way. Shapes that always escape immediate reading and static interpretation; shapes that are enigmatic, ambiguous in the most creative sense of the word: that, which excites our interest, our dynamic response; shapes that, successfully accompanied by colour, produce new archetypes and enduring creations.
Creations that recast the artisitc dimension of the energy of life, with the broader - metaphysical -sense of the word.The artist's compositions are like turning-points in a mystic initiation: enduring symbols communicating a microcosm in the image and likeness of the macrocosm. In each case, a genesis, a rite and, at the same time, an escape from the human destiny is taking place. Transmitters and receivers of the utmost energy due to which spirit and matter constitute the two sides of the same supreme truth, Pavlopoulou's works startle us by the energy they bear and radiate, which establishes in each case the artist's creative passion and complete surrender to her talent.
A passion that, along with the poetry and quality of her works, place Pavlopoulou on the first ranks of contemporary Greek artists.
