They said > Ismene V. Kapandai

ISMENE V. KAPANDAI

The «Brave Lad» in the work of Natalia Mela

IN TIMES GONE BY, people who are out for a stroll gaze abstractedly, sometimes commenting on what they see; a rare picture nowadays, time flies too quickly now and the fast rhythms of life push us to the limits of our strength. For those of us, however, who have somehow managed to remain intact and retain a trace of internal balance, if they happen to be passing by Mourouzi Street and, if, by chance the gate to number 5 is open, then, they will find themselves facing a fickle and very charming world. They will be confronted with wild beasts consorting in brotherly fashion with domestic pets, pensive girls in the company of brave lads whiling away their time in the sun or the rain, depending on the season, all of them peacefully coexisting with ancient philosophers. They will also see caiques and fishing boats and bulls and roosters and owls, the work, all of it, of one woman, the sculptor, Natalia Mela.

These works, and many others which also stood in this yard once, but now belong to some art collection or have been erected in a particular place, compose her work, very important work, multi-faceted, multi-level, charming, imaginative and witty. Besides its clear and very strong sculptural qualities that exploit its very existence to dominate the surrounding space, her works have another special quality, which sweeps the viewer away on a spiritual journey and is not related to a particular series, but to each individual work, whether it belongs to the «Mythological works» or the «Brave Lads», where we would expect the subject to produce such a reaction in the viewer, but also to her «Tools», her» Blacksmith works» as she, herself, calls them, or again to the «Animal works», her hens and roosters, her goats and bulls, more real than the real thing, carrying inside them some other truth, the truth of her art. I wonder what her secret is?

«I like to wander around quarries and look at the marbles», she told me once. «The tranquility and the silence that prevail in these places helps me to see forms that already exist within me. In my memory and, as well, in man's collective memory, wherever he may be, myths are sleeping their serene sleep; they will be resurrected in my work», and, «For me, myth is closer to truth than history, just as meteorites when hurtling through the stratosphere are polished and reach earth glittering, so the same thing happens to myths, which, with the passing of time become more alive, begin to sparkle, to stimulate and enchant, touching us, moving us».

Indeed we are moved. Her works, each to a different degree, great or small, touch us. Above all, yes, more than anything else, «these works portray the theme dearest to her heart to the accomplishment of which she now returns and will return again and again, I mean the etermal symbol of the Greeks, the pallekari (or the Brave Lad), at the glorious height of his youth and courage». Thus wrote Dimitrios Pikionis in a review of Mela's exhibition, referring to her marble relief sculptures depicting the «Kleftes» - resistance fighters - of 1821.

This was prophetic of Pikionis, the great teacher, because this image of the Brave Lad, or Pallekari does indeed, recur in Mela's work - perfect, ideal beings, heroes and gods, Apollo and St George, especially her superb St George, the dragon-slayer, and Pavlos Melas, and Hermes, the protector of thieves, among others, who is portrayed with his winged sandals, fleeing with his booty, a lamb that he has snatched from some sheepfold. And it recurs again in Barbatsis, the hero of Spetses, and in Cecrops, the mythical half-snake half-man with his scaled tail, the hero of Athens, monumental work, as Angelos Delivorrias pointed, out - ideal images, all of them, young, beautiful and vigorous, in the hour of their glory, before the passing of time has touched and ravaged them, «with the joy of incorruptibility in their eyes».

Whoever it is that is presented each time, whatever his name, the representation (not the form) remains steadfast, the Brave Lad, the mythical youth, the hero who has been endowed by the gods with all their gifts, the youth that does not hesitate at all, when the moment comes, to step forward with open arms, generously offering everything to everyone, the «Pallekari» which «by praising him we do nothing more than praise virtue itself».

November 18, 2007
Ismene V. Kapandai

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