michalis zacharias

42 Notara st10683, AthensGreece

+30 2108215973

+30 6937418213

miczax10@yahoo.comwww.dsub.gr/art/michaliszacharias.htm

education

2003 - 06 MA in Digital Arts, Athens School of Fine Arts, Athens, Greece1995 - 01 Studies in Fine Arts, Athens School of Fine Arts, Athens, Greece

selected group exhibitions

2007"Emergency Room", Centre for Contemporary Art Ileana Tounta, Athens2007"Meatspace, Actionfield Kodra '07", Thessaloniki.2004"Non Material World, Digital Arts Festival", Club 22, Athens. 2003"Solus Locus", Gazon Rouge, Athens. 2002"Senses", Gazi, Athens. 2002"Suburbia, the endless areas of the athenian suburbs", Alpha Station, Athens.

bio

2001"A/37 - 58° B/23 - 43°, One night exhibition" Filopappou Hill, Athens.

workshops - participations

2007Participation on the "Arab Guggenheim Museum" workshop, organized by Nikos Charalam-bides and presented at the 1st Thessaloniki Biennale of Contemporary Art 2005Participation on a speech concerning Feminist Art, which took place as a parallel event at the "Videographies - The early decades" exhibition, organized by the National Museum of Contemporary Art. Ergostasio, Athens School of Fine Arts.

selected publications

2007"Actionfield Kodra 07", catalogue concerning the 7th Visual Arts festival in Kalamaria -Thessaloniki, published by the Cultural Organisation Municipality of Kalamaria2007"Meatspace", interview of Christoforos Marinos-curator of the exhibition "Meatspace", which took place at the "Actionfield Kodra 07" festival, Highlights magazine issue #302003"Without Limits, the endless areas of the athenian suburbs", edited by Nikos Kazeros & Pavlos Lefas, FUTURA publications

awards

20013rd place in the competition concerning the participation on the Biennale of Young Artists from Europe and the Mediterranean X Edition, which took place in Serajevo

exploring the picture elements

The main proposal is to resample already existing images into new ones, emphasiz-ing on the elementary parts of the picture such as the pixels of a digital image, the dots of a photographic image or everything that can be taken as basic elements of the picture. The objective aim is to enlarge and make the parts of an image not only visible, but in some cases even more significant than the whole image. This alteration of the image has a result which redefines its aesthetics while the initial representation and its meaning loses its weight and becomes secondary, sometimes even "absent", compressed only verbally in the title of each work. While the images become more and more unrecognisable, the main concept is expanding and it is getting similar with the objectives of Abstract Art but in a more conceptual manner due to the philosophical exploration of the morphology, aes-thetics and meaning of the "particles" in an image. Optical perception is one of our primary senses and the role of vision amongst the more significant stimulants for human brain. We are undeniably cover the time of image and the innumerous of optical stimulants that overrun our brains, consequence image`s "aura" diminishing. Therefore the main goal for images’ creators or observers is the main-tenance of their emotional power through their belief upon their impact on our daily life. The specific belief can be formed into an almost religious conception of the image, a new "iconolatry" towards the image itself, through an artistic "fetishism" concerning the picture elements, which can be accomplished through the reform of the image caused by the exploration and magnification of its inner structure. The development of digital media especially, and their inner connection to the con-sisting parts of an image, form a new field of perception and possibilities strongly related to the meaning of an image itself, digital or not.

statement

Christoforos Marinos on Zacharias` work in the catalogue of Meatspace / Pro-Taseis Action Field Kodra 2007

Michalis Zacharias` series of scanned black and white drawings that present images of de-struction and desolation which he, as a ragman himself, collected from newspapers. In the particular drawings, which were produced in A4 size in 2001, the artist is examining both the stylistics of post-historical image and its infectious spreading. In his work "Signs: Depic-tion and basic particles- Ending up in digital image", Zacharias quotes Jean Baudrillard`s "Transparency of evil", which proves remarkably revealing in terms of the production of such drawings: "the best part of today`s images, video, painting, plastic arts, audiovisual media, images of composition, are literally images in which there is nothing for you to see, images that lack traces, lack shadow, lack the consequences. What we feel by looking at them is that behind each and every one of them something has disappeared." Six years later, Zacharias` frozen images bring a strange sense of contemporaneousness-utterly timeless and perpetual.

drawings

mad cow200120x28 cm.ink on paper

lake200120x28 cm.ink on paper

garbage2006125x157 cm.lambda print mounted on aluminium

volcano2006125x157 cm.lambda print mounted on aluminium

bomb200120x28 cm.ink on paper

airplane200120x28 cm.ink on paper

"Artists today program forms more than they compose them: rather than transfigure a raw element(blank canvas, clay, etc.), they remix available forms and make use of data."

prints

Nicolas Bourriaud, Postproduction

Nicolas Bourriaud, Postproduction

electric chair200735x35 cm.inkjet print on Verona paper

gas chamber200735x35 cm.inkjet print on Verona paper

lethal injection200735x35 cm.inkjet print on Verona paper

landscape IV2007125x340 cm.inkjet print on canvas

bulldozer2006125x125 cm.lambda print mounted on aluminium

tsunami2006125x125 cm.lambda print mounted on aluminium

flight 3582007125x125 cm.lambda print mounted on aluminium

beirut2006125x125 cm.lambda print mounted on aluminium

gaza2006125x125 cm.lambda print mounted on aluminium

sunset2007125x125 cm.lambda print mounted on aluminium

sunset II2007125x125 cm.lambda print mounted on aluminium

sunset III2007125x125 cm.lambda print mounted on aluminium

sunset IV2007125x125 cm.lambda print mounted on aluminium

video/installations

"Since computer media consist from samples which are represented in a com-puter as numbers, a computer program can access every sample in turn and modify its value according to some algorithm."

Lev Manovich, The Language of New Media.

las meninas2006video (program resampling image)

landscape2006multimedia installation

self portrait 30x30 pixels2006video (program reforming image into text)

self portrait 30x30 pixels