Born in Athens, Greece in 1980. Manolis Tzortzakakis attended the Athens School of Fine Arts from 2002 to 2007, when he graduated with honors. He currently lives and works in the United States.
Forces of structure and chaos, desire and sorrow, are the touchstone of the Greek-born artist Manolis Tzortzakakis’ work. At first look, Manolis’ compositions gratify the eye. Their earthy tones and arrangement of lines and shapes draw out a harmony of color and proportion. But when the texture of the materials he uses to create this harmony comes into focus, everything deepens. Discarded things: burlap, fabric, linen, wood, paper, cement— are salvaged and resurrected in Manolis’ work. Their raw energy is fused with acrylic to create symmetric, solved-puzzle-like landscapes. They evoke the order we continually try to impose on our bodies and our lives, a narrative we keep trying to demand from our experience. But from the melancholy of carefully chosen materials— torn, second-hand, fractured— a paradox emerges: The joy of stability and balance is simultaneously contradicted by the vulnerable, broken, and exposed nature of experience. Holes in burlap draw us inward, subtlety of tone pushes us out. The absurdity of a damaged wholeness becomes a visually poetic experience.
