In the frame of the Art Athina Young Artist Award 2023 

Opening: Thursday 12 September 2024, 20:00

A primary, cosmogenic, overwhelming tide of materials, meanings, signs and experiences is about to happen on the occasion of Stefania Strouza's new exhibition entitled "Primary Tide" at MOMus-Museum Alex Mylonas (Agioi Asomaton Square 5, Thissio) in Athens, from 12 September to 3 November 3, 2024. 

The exhibition takes place within the frame of the programmatic collaboration of MOMus-Museum of Contemporary Art with the Panhellenic Association of Art Galleries and Art Athina fair for the Young Artist Award, seeking to support and promote the work of young contemporary artists.

In the "Primary Tide" exhibition, which could be described as a retrospective of Strouza’s work over the last 10 years, the starting points of her inspiration and her working framework are captured. Consistent in her work, she herself combines and captures elements of geography, culture, art, history, mythology, science and philosophy, with her sculptural compositions, her in situ installations, the mix of natural and synthetic materials in the production process of her works.

Nature and man's altered relationship with it now runs through the broad and interdisciplinary and theoretical background of Strouza’s work, in an attempt to indicate the depth of the inconsistency and the need to restore this destructive disorder.The exhibition is accompanied by a bilingual catalogue, supported by Art Athina. The exhibition is also part of the Museum’s tribute exhibition series, entitled “Four Women Artists-Four Attitudes” series, which features women artists and curators. 

Exhibition curator: Domna Gounari, MOMus Curator

The Young Artist Award Art Athina 2023 

Stefania Strouza who is represented by the a.antonopoulou.art gallery is the holder of the Art Athina Young Artist Award 2023. The Award, established by the fair in 2022, aims to strengthen artistic creation; artists up to 45 years of age, who live and work in Greece and are recommended by the gallery that represents them, where they have made at least one individual exhibition, can be nominated for the award.

After evaluating the 18 nominated works submitted by the artists and the galleries representing them, the jury unanimously decided to award the prize to Stefania Strouza. The jury recognized the consistency, coherence, research depth, and diversity of the artistic pursuits in Stefania Strouza’s work, which spans a wide range of media. The jury also took note of the multidimensional nature of her work and career so far, as well as the relevance and importance of the themes she addresses and the theoretical-research framework underpinning her artistic approach. 

The Young Artist Award Art Athina 2024 will be announced on Friday 20 September 2024 at 18:00, during a special event, at Zappeion Megaron, in Athens.

Parallel events

Public talk «Primary Tide: Stefania Strouza’s dynamic practice in the frame of the Art Athina Talks 

Friday 20 September 2024, 17:30-18:00

Zappeion Megaron, Athens 

Speakers: Domna Gounari, MOMus Curator / Christian Oxenius, Independent Curator and Head of Research for the International Biennial Association / Stefania Strouza, Visual Artist / Yorgos Tzirtzilakis, Professor, Department of Architecture, University of Thessaly

Entrance with the Art Athina ticket. Please find all Information, here https://art-athina.gr/en/ 

Stefania Strouza CV 

Stefania Strouza is a visual artist currently living and working in Athens. Her practice explores how cultural narratives of diverse epochs connect to produce new identity projects. It examines the exchange of forms and symbols across large distances and the cross-cultural syncretisms that emerge from it. The artist materialises these ideas through sculptural works and installations that draw associations between the symbolic world of objects and notions of temporality, corporeality, and geography. 

Her work has been featured nationally and internationally in solo and group exhibitions. Solo exhibitions (selection): Water abandons itself. Gold takes life over., a.antonopoulou.art, 2024· I my Sea Journey, I my Land Claim, Old Oil Mill Factory, Eleusis Cultural Capital of Europe, Elefsina, 2023· 212 Medea (Recited from an Empty Middle), AnnexM, Megaron-The Athens Concert Hall, Athens, 2021· Currents and Currencies, a.antonopoulou.art, Athens, 2017· Shore, Wiener Art Foundation, Wien, 2016· To a certain degree sacredness is in the eye of the beholder / Act V, Neue Galerie Innsbruck, Innsbruck, 2015· To a certain degree sacredness is in the eye of the beholder / Act III, Athens & Epidaurus Festival, 2014. Group exhibitions (selection): Plasmata II: Ioannina, organized by the Onassis Stegi, Ioannina, 2023· The Mediterranean: A Round Sea, ARCO Madrid, with a.antonopoulou.art, Madrid, 2023· Mr. Robinson Crusoe Stayed Home: Adventures of Design in Times of Crisis, Benaki Museum, Athens, 2021· Ride into the Sun, 3rd Industrial Art Biennial, Istria, 2020· The Palace at 4 a.m. –collaboration of NEON with the Whitechapel Gallery–, Archaeological.

Museum of Mykonos, 2019· Ad Astra, Pinta Miami, Miami, 2018· Imagined Homes, 6th Thessaloniki Biennale of Contemporary Art, State Museum of Contemporary Art, 2017· Desk in Exile, Bauhaus Dessau Foundation, Dessau, 2016· No Country for Young Men: Contemporary Greek Art in Times of Crisis, BOZAR, Brussels, 2014· Afresh: A New Generation of Greek Artists, National Museum of Contemporary Art-EMST, Athens, 2013.

Strouza has received numerous accolades such as the Art Athina Award 2023, the Inspire Prize of MOMus- Museum of Contemporary Art (2021), the ARTWORKS Award (Stavros Niarchos Foundation Artist Fellowship Program) (2018), the Emerging Artists Award of the National Bank of Greece (2017), and the Diploma

Award of the Academy of Fine Arts Vienna (2015). She has been an artist-inresidence at the Seeger Center for Hellenic Studies in Princeton University, US (2016), the Bauhaus Dessau Foundation, DE (2016), at Studio Residency in Mexico City, MX (2018) with the support of the Austrian Federal Chancellery, at MANA

Contemporary New Jersey, US (2019), at CCA Andratx in Mallorca, ES (2020), and at ISCP, US (2021).

With prior graduate studies at the School of Architecture of the National Technical University of Athens (2007), Strouza also holds an MFA in Environmental Art from the Edinburgh College of Art (2010) along with a Magister in Fine Arts from the Academy of Fine Arts Vienna (2015). She is currently a PhD candidate at the Architecture Department of the University of Thessaly.

www.stefaniastrouza.com