Set to open this weekend, ‘Nymphs’ is the latest exhibition by visual artist Dina Tourvas.
Made up of cibachrome prints with ink drawing-stitching, the original black and white photographs were surprisingly enough discovered under a rock and decaying, which brought about a revelation for Tourvas.
“Images of beautiful young women apparently posing for [a] modelling career were discarded. Were they the losers? We shall never know, but from that moment these objects entered into another realm, that of the visual arts. The lucky find was a revelation for me,” she says.
The images of the women, torn in places and covered in mould, inspired the artist to reflect on the process of decay all living things inevitably experience.
Tourvas recalls deciding in that moment to allow the process to continue on its course for another year or so.
The more faded and mould-ridden the images became, the more the photographic chemicals emphasised the cycle of life-decay-death, while also capturing the concept of eternal youth, which is explored through the nymphs in the mythology of Greece and other countries – hence the exhibition’s title.
“I re-photographed the objects with cibachrome film and superimposed ink drawings of fertility symbols, thus my modern ‘Nymphs’ came to be,” explains
Tourvas, adding that the superimposed ink drawings are the visual poetry of the theme, while the stitching of the borders is her adoration and crowning of eternal youth and eternal death.
“[It] is a symbolic statement relating to the process of decay affecting all living matter on this planet, and the rebirth of new life, the eternal cycle of life and death.”
‘Nymphs’ is showing from 8-16 July at The Shop Gallery, 112 Glebe Point Rd, Glebe, NSW from 10.00 am-6.00 pm. The official opening will take place on Saturday 9 July from 5.00 pm-8.00 pm. For more information, email theshopgalleryglebe@gmail.com or call 0438 550 835.