After nearly a decade, Spyros Agathou returns to the Kypriaki Gonia Gallery in Larnaca with his new solo exhibition, “unnamed.” The new series of works focuses on the inner world and the complex experience of emotion—the way it is experienced, transformed, and seeks a space to express itself.
“unnamed” does not attempt to depict specific emotions or confine them to definitions. Instead, it creates a space where experience can remain open—it seeks that moment when an inner experience takes shape without losing its ambiguity. Painting becomes the medium through which Agathou approaches that which constantly shifts between tension and calm, closeness and distance, presence and absence. Agathou’s painting operates through this distance: it does not explain, but leaves traces; it does not offer answers, but creates the conditions for personal recognition.
ΣΧΕΤΙΚΑ ΑΡΘΡΑ
The need to give form to what happens within us runs through human expression from the earliest images to contemporary art. Through different media and across different eras, humans continually return to the image, the gesture, color, and matter to approach experiences that are difficult to capture in a clear description. “unnamed” indirectly engages with this timeless need, translating it into Agathos’s personal painting practice.
The artist does not attempt to depict a specific emotion. He approaches it through the very act of painting itself. The process is direct, physical, and gradual. Working primarily with his hands, he uses pigments and successive layers, building up the surface through a continuous process of adding, removing, covering, and revealing.
“unnamed” invites the viewer to experience the painting not only as an image, but as an experience. To observe how a surface can alter one’s mood, how a color can evoke an unexpected memory or sensation, and how something as familiar as a color can, within a different context, take on an entirely new meaning.
“unnamed” leaves this encounter open-ended. It does not ask the viewer to identify what the artist is feeling or to seek a single interpretation. It invites the viewer to observe how a surface can alter their mood, how a color can evoke an unexpected memory or sensation, and how something as familiar as a color can, within a different context, take on a completely new meaning.
With his return to the Kypriaki Gonia Gallery, nearly ten years after his last solo exhibition there, Spyros Agathou presents a body of work that encapsulates his artistic journey to date, while simultaneously opening a new chapter. “unnamed” is not merely a new series of works, but a mature shift toward a style of painting that is more introspective, sensory, and open — a style of painting that leaves room for emotion to emerge without always needing to be defined, thus allowing the lived experience to connect with the viewer beyond personal boundaries and predetermined interpretations.
Spyros Agathou
Spyros Agathou was born in Nicosia and is originally from Larnaca, where he lives and works. He studied painting at the Pietro Vannucci Academy of Fine Arts in Perugia, Italy, completing his studies with distinction and the highest honors. In 2003, he was admitted to the Master’s program in Fine Arts at the Complutense University of Madrid, in the Department of Theory and Practice of Contemporary Art.
He has been recognized for his work in printmaking in Italy and Cyprus and has presented two solo exhibitions at the Kypriaki Gonia Gallery: MIMNISKO (2007) and MIMNISKO II (2016). He has participated in numerous group and collaborative exhibitions in Cyprus and abroad, including “Lallaros” at Art Project Space in Athens (2025), “DUOLOGUE” at the Diatopos Center for Contemporary Art in Nicosia (2021), and “Inside–Out Stories” at the Pierides Museum – Bank of Cyprus Cultural Foundation in Larnaca (2023).
His work has been exhibited in Cyprus, Italy, Spain, Mexico, Greece, and the United Kingdom. His practice is characterized by a distinctive approach to the painted surface and material, in which process, repetition, and accumulation play a central role in shaping the image.
The exhibition is curated by Chrysilia Filiastidi, an art historian and curator, who holds degrees in Art History and Business Administration and a master’s degree in Arts and Cultural Management. Her work focuses on developing exhibitions through research and close collaboration with artists. Her collaboration with Agathou began with the exhibition “Lallaros” in Athens in November 2025, where seven Cypriot artists, using different media, techniques, and personal perspectives, explored how the deeply Cypriot experience of summer and heat is embedded in their work.
unnamed
Solo exhibition by Spyros Agathos
Curated by: Chrysilia Filiastidi
October 16–31, 2026
Kypriaki Gonia Gallery, 45 Stadiou Street, Larnaca 6020, Cyprus
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Website: www.gallerykypriakigonia.com.cy
