To start of the New Year 2009, the Pantheon Gallery has approached six upcoming Graphic Designers/ Multimedia Artists and has subtlety asked them a question: “Would you like your concrete, medium or rare?”

Giving emphasis to “letting” the artists express themselves freely and thus within an open context, each artist will approach the question with his or her individual technique, thought, concept. The artists include Poppy Aristidou, Zara Der Arakelian, Alex Kouvara, Christopher Malapitan, Anna Photiadou and Xenios Zittis.

Zara Der Arakelian:

“I would like my concrete with a heart”

Concrete is any number of emotions and experiences related to a sense of strong affection. The word concrete can refer to a variety of different feelings, states, and attitudes, ranging from generic pleasure to intense interpersonal attraction. This diversity of meanings, combined with the complexity of the feelings involved, makes concrete unusually difficult to consistently define, even compared to other emotional states. As an abstract concept, concrete usually refers to a deep ineffable feeling of tenderly caring for another person. Even this limited conception of concrete, however, encompasses a wealth of different feelings, from the passionate desire and intimacy of romantic concrete to the nonsexual emotional closeness of familial and platonic concrete.

Xenios Zittis:

Feelingless people, empty, apathetic, robots.
Everything dark, colourless, odourless, tasteless, dead.
Bird’s songs no more heard.
Dreams and desires trapped, within concrete walls,
Raised around us, walls of separation, walls of hate.
We float in an endless concrete sea that will eventually drown us.

Q: Would you like you like your concrete medium or rare?
A: Well done, please!

Alex Kouvara:

We are nearly concreted mass reproductions

A declaration of concrete formation in local and foreign cities and urban living, outgrowing the need to breath and live in natural habitats, the concrete is surrounding our lives and choking our lungs, what is our destination?

All that we will become are statues in time, now becomes then, after becomes too late. She is in control of the cycle, she has to choose over fashionable architecture, she will regenerate mythological image into future self. She is a protagonist. She is a quotation. She is a repetition. She is the status. She is she. She is THE STATUE.

Poppy Aristidou:

What if concrete= chaos in your everyday life?
How much of it is in your life, how much of it do you want and how would you like it?

What if you are suffering from multiple personality disorder…?

Multiple personality disorder (MPD) is a psychiatric disorder characterized by having at least one "alter" personality that controls behavior. The "alters" are said to occur spontaneously and involuntarily, and function more or less independently of each other. The unity of consciousness, by which we identify our selves, is said to be absent in MPD.

My work is a combination of digital printed illustrations in combination with sound.

This is done in a way so that each of us can experience everyday life through the eyes of a person suffering (MPD).

Anna Photiadou:

Time crevasse

Existing in reality or in real experience and perceptible by the senses, trees and animals are “concrete” objects. A hard, strong construction material consisting of sand, conglomerate gravel, pebbles and broken stone holds the heads of animals. Burned out skies or what is perceived as skies and surrounding environment, relating to things that can be perceived by the senses, as opposed to abstractions and metaphors.

Chris Malapitan:

I claim ownership of the following items please

I prepare the long list of objects I’ll require for the next two months. I will venture out to various outlets and scan the exotic possibilities. I buy it all. I store it in multicoloured untagged containers. I insert it in a cool dry place. I claim ownership of the following items please. I smile.