“Instead of formulating thoughts through words, I compose with layered colors.”
– Athene Galiciadis, modern artist
Athene Galiciadis’ work attracts its power from the motion of repeated kinds. Across work, sculptures and installations, the Zurich-based artist makes use of grids, curves and blocks of colour to construct a proper language formed by sample, materials experimentation and references spanning concrete artwork, design, craft, science and literature.
Galiciadis’ “Stillleben (Reflection on Longings and Belongings)” and “Stillleben (Window)” have been chosen for the Art Basel in Basel (ABB) 2026 Collection on Samsung Art Store. The works have been chosen for his or her robust use of colour and sample, qualities that translate naturally to the digital viewing expertise on Samsung Art Store. Created in partnership with Art Basel, the digital assortment options works by Switzerland-based artists from taking part galleries and brings modern artwork from the honest to Samsung Art Store subscribers worldwide. Samsung Newsroom spoke with Galiciadis about kind, colour, the concepts behind the chosen works and the way digital presentation can convey artwork into the house.
A Personal Language Through Patterns
Q. Your work has a definite language of shapes, colours and supplies. How did this visible system develop?
I started creating this visible language whereas finding out Fine Arts at ECAL(École cantonale d’artwork de Lausanne) in Lausanne. At the time, many artists within the Lausanne artwork scene have been working with Neo-Geo aesthetics. I admired the rigor of that language, however I by no means absolutely related with its precision. Rather than adopting it straight, I attempted to translate it into one thing that felt nearer to me.
I began working with geometric kinds, patterns, repetition and symmetry, however I intentionally embraced the handmade. Every form was drawn or painted by hand, making it distinctive and barely totally different from the one beside it. The patterns shifted subtly throughout the floor, not by way of a predetermined system, however by way of the small variations that naturally come up from guide repetition.
Q. How do you consider rhythm, variation and alter inside a composition?
Repetition has all the time been central to my apply, however I’ve by no means been excited by repetition as precise duplication. Because my kinds are drawn and painted by hand, no aspect is ever fully similar to a different. A line turns into barely thicker, a form shifts, a colour adjustments in depth. These variations accumulate and create a way of motion throughout the floor.
I typically consider repetition when it comes to rhythm reasonably than sample. A sample suggests a hard and fast system, whereas rhythm permits for fluctuation, pauses, accelerations and sudden turns. In that sense, my compositions are maybe nearer to biology than to geometry. They are structured, however by no means fully predictable. They repeat, however by no means in precisely the identical approach. Over time, this visible language has grow to be greater than a device. I see it as a placeholder for “in-betweenness,” a method to maintain ambiguity, transition and a number of meanings directly.
Q. How a lot of a piece is deliberate earlier than you start and the way a lot is determined by way of the act of constructing it?
I normally start with a really clear picture in my thoughts. I feel visually, so many works begin as an virtually full psychological image reasonably than an idea expressed in…
