Microcommission: 'Carte Postale' by Melina Fakitsa Mosland (Copy)

Melina Fakitsa Mosland, Carte Postale, Watercolor pencils and ballpoint pen on canvas, 95 x 50 cm, 2020

Commissioned by RUYA MAPS

As Athens is a city of contradictions Melina Fakitsa Mosland chose a colour palette of blues and yellows with the occasional red for her commissioned work. The palette was selected in order to give Carte Postale a romanticised feeling which the viewer knows to be ironic given the contrast with the actual content of the work. This can be seen to comment on the romanticised view of Athens which is often taken as an artist’s idyll, despite the difficulties artists and related practitioners face working in the city without substantial government support.

“For Fakitsa Mosland this picture showed a failed attempt to create modernity and luxury which she identifies as ‘classically Athenian’”

The artist initially gathered images of the city into a collage of pictures that she then used as the basis for the painting. The final work was then realised through an illustration approach that Fakitsa Mosland has developed using watercolour pencils and acrylics on canvas .

In the first picture we see two building blocks, or ‘’polikatoikies‘’ as they are called in Greek framing the scene. Set by the coast line while a horde of pigeons passes through the blue sky, the image shows a view of the city which is not defined by its ancient remnants. For Fakitsa Mosland this picture showed a failed attempt to create modernity and luxury which she identifies as ‘‘classically Athenian.’’ The second picture in the trio shows a delivery worker riding through an industrial part of the city on a hot summer’s day. The last picture shows a typical neighborhood house with its entrance surrounded by some examples of the city’s flora.

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