Johniene Papandreas: Opening the window to the unseen

When the artist Johniene Papandreas closed a door on one part of her life, she opened a window. This saying is pretty much appropriate for her, given her transition from her work to her art.

This is also evident in Papandreas’ new exhibit of her art starting March 18 at Gallery Lazzaro in in Palm Desert, California.

Expected to run until April 25, Papandreas’ show, “A Space Between Breaths,” is supposed to explore the unsaid and the unseen.

Johniene Papandreas: What she sees

Papandreas said this perspective of “the unsaid” and “the unseen” was honed by years working in theater and corporate design.

“It’s not so much about what’s happening on the stage as about what has happened, what will happen, and what is happening off stage,” Papandreas said.

She added, “It’s all about subtext. And it’s the same with my paintings. It’s about freezing those fleeting micro-expressions that you don’t see, but you sense.”

Papandreas moved from a career in New York theatre design to a business designing Corporate Theatre and Events. After 25 years, she returned to fine art.

Her history, combined with her insights into human nature, informs her art.

Johniene Papandreas: In her words

“I am fascinated with subtext,” she said.”Reading between the lines– tuning in to the unspoken. Mine are portraits of imagined selves, damaged, passionate, and hidden selves. Expressions captured of a moment thought private, unobserved, before the retreat– before the walls go back up.”

“Guided by past masters, passionate in their revelation of the human condition, I seek out the souls that populate their paintings– the complex expressions, hidden agendas, and faces stripped of artifice, laid bare by ecstasy,” she said.

“Lifting them out of their place and time, I take them as my models. I listen carefully and translate. Your eyes meet theirs– something is familiar– you connect, and across the centuries spirits speak,” she added.

This exhibit has four series: Fixation (a series on human expression); Botanica (on the lush mysteries of nature); Body Language (which is targeted to elicit a visceral rather than emotional response from viewers); and a yet-to-be named fourth series.

Papandreas’s other paintings and commissions are part of numerous private national and international collections.

Interested about reading further on the artist Johniene Papandreas? Check out Lesbian News’ interview with her in the March issue of the magazine. You can also watch this video about her below: