Fleeting Rest is an exhibition of new works on canvas and paper exploring painting’s performativity in relation to domestic spaces and rituals. Unassuming objects like tea cups and edibles, alongside textile patterns and traces of light, animate memory and reflections evoking textures of time. With both abstract and figurative elements, the works invite us to partake in painting’s ability to activate and uncover nuance in happenstances, transforming our perception of events into something more resonant.
 

The works explore the puzzling unknown embedded in the familiar and extend a gesture of hospitality, implying a continuity between the fictional space of the work and the physical space occupied by the viewer. With a sensibility for cinematic storytelling, Matosian rearranges the otherwise inconsequential into an area of imaginative leaps that de-emphasise plot in favour of “shots” that reflect on or even shift the meaning of what
comes next.

 

The exhibition, curated by Evagoras Vanezis and Demetra Ignatiou, presents a reading of Matosian's work that emphasizes intuitive juxtaposition and scoring of encounters; their notation and composition. The title, Fleeting Rest, is a nod to the stillness in the moment before the leap, highlighting the space between the artworks and the lived moments they inhabit.

 

Vasilis Matosian (b.1990) completed a BA (Hons) Painting at Camberwell College, University of the Arts, London. Selected solo exhibitions: 2023 ‘Rainbow’s end; still lifes and a smile’, The O Gallery, Larnaca, Cyprus; 2018 'The Balloon', Apocalypse Gallery, Nicosia, Cyprus; 2014 'Oranges, Toothbrushes and Other Stories', Cornaro Institute, Larnaca, Cyprus. Selected group exhibitions: 2021 Larnaca Biennale 'Limitless Limits', Pierides Museum, Larnaca, Cyprus; 2016 'Show Home', Safehouse 1, London, UK; 2015 'Two invitations: Petros Moris and Vassilis Christofi', Point Centre for Contemporary Art, Nicosia.