POETIC ARCHITECTURE (2005)
Poetic architectural images and compositions characterize Warlamis’ artistic work and position in the dialogue of the European avant-garde of the late 20th and early 21st centuries.
Inspired by the Folk Architecture of the Aegean and the artistic tradition of Vienna, he paints dreamlike buildings as a reaction to the functional, rationalist perception that dominates contemporary architectural creation.
he himself writes…
« My houses are poetic, full of signs and symbols. My houses are like paradoxical creations. Subversive, mysterious, enchanted. They are joyful and lively. One can have a fantastic view of the world, of the endless panorama of nature through a cloud window, or a star window. My houses are made to be felt. They are for all the senses. My houses are for the blind. The transparent antennas of my houses reach the most distant stars of the universe. People from all over the world live in my houses. Africans, North and South Americans, Australians, Asians and Europeans. These are houses for every culture and for everyone who wants to preserve their childhood »
what they said…
PRESENTATION OF THE COLLECTION
Works from the POETICAL ARCHITECTURE collection were presented in Germany (Frankfurt, D.A.M 1985), in France (Paris, Grand Palais 1989), in Great Britain (London, New Architecture building 2005) in Russia (Moscow, Academy of Fine Arts 2010) and in Greece (Thessaloniki, National Archaeological Museum 1990. Athens, Zappeion Mansion 1991, Palace of the Grand Master of Rhodes 1991, Benaki Museum 2005).
PAINTINGS
PHOTOS FROM THE COLLECTION PRESENTATIONS
INVITATION & POSTER
PUBLICATION COVERS
ADVERTISEMENT FOR THE BENAKIS MUSEUM EXHIBITION
Learn more!
How you too can design a “Poetic House” with Warlamis’ instructions.
Instructions: First of all, stay away from any utilitarian thinking. This will never lead you to the goal. Rather, choose the “stupid” game, the creative ecstasy and these will lead to the desired result. Only in this way can the invisible and the inconceivable be written, everything that lies behind the frugal images of the momentary recording of reality. Because a reality contains within it other realities and other worlds and other horizons.
1st Exercise
Close your eyes and see and tell us, tell us what you see. What do you prefer? Do you want to present us with your dream space? What materials do you use? Shiny marble slabs? Steel, aluminum and glass and heavy curtains, a lit fireplace and candles, designer furniture and strange lighting fixtures?
2nd Exercise
Draw a blue potato. You heard right (read), a blue potato, beautiful and plump. The potato’s eyes are windows and doors. Draw vertical and horizontal grooves, niches and protrusions. Then draw a pepper house, a melon house, a mushroom house, a banana house. Choose an ordinary small pebble or better yet several small pebbles and draw them. Since their shapes are relatively simple, it is not difficult to draw them. Make photocopies in reduction or enlargement. Just kidding…
Take a piece of A4 or A3 paper, crumple it up in your hands and squeeze it into a small ball. Dip the paper ball in a plate of light blue paint and unfold the paper. The surface of the paper has now become more refined, more alive and looks more interesting. And a half-burnt paper or one that has turned yellow and smoked from the candle flame also contains this stimulus for poetry and creation.
Or try the following experiment. Pour water into a rectangular pan. Dissolve some oil paint in turpentine and add them to the water in the pan as well. More turpentine and less oil paint. The paint floats in the water and forms irregular shapes that change when you stir the liquids with a pencil in different directions. With a simple touch of the paper to the surface you have the simplest printing method.
The paper takes on an interesting surface with shapes and color like snake skin. Repetition with different colors and substances brings admirable results.
This process is necessary to stimulate the vision and the spirit. On such a surface it is pleasant to play and draw. Another technique for preparing the paper is done with a sewing machine. Pass the paper through the machine and fill it with holes and if you want, add various threads. And on the back of the paper, where the holes protrude, rub with sandpaper.
Try to draw a straight line.
You will understand very quickly that this goal is impossible. We cannot draw straight lines because we are living organisms and as living beings we depend on the fluctuations of breathing, pressure and our psychological mood. So, from this perspective, it is interesting that we cannot draw a straight line without a ruler or a triangle, as geometry requires. Living people leave living traces, living lines, where different thicknesses, directions and flows are discernible.
