Kyriazi’s work is multi-layered in meaning and subtle in its message as well as soft in its formal nuances. She works with the idea of human perception creating works that relay its often imperceptible differences, those felt more than seen, or those discovered. It is suggestive rather than literal in that it needs to be deciphered not only seen. As early as the 80s she was working with layers wherein her lines intersected like networks of colored wires overlapping, crossing, knotting and returning to their original position. Kyriazi’s work is complex but not just in métier as was the work I just cited, but also in content. It is philosophical in the sense that it makes the viewer think because he’s never really sure of what he’s examining. This element is also found in her last series Windows that she showed in the exhibition entitled The Tyranny of Light. Depicted in Kyriazis’ video and installation photographs was a man against a network of what appeared to be window blinds or steps, one was never really sure which. Thus the reading is left open to the viewer’s interpretation, it was and is for him to unravel the subject matter in multiple ways; as voyeur looking through blinds, or as figure ascending steps, or even as abstract design.

Then I saw in the mirror glass, silkscreen and pastel on sandpaper, 9x22 in.

Kyriazi continues her preoccupation with windows as apertures of enlightenment and entrances into other stages on which the existential drama is depicted. Now she’s drawn us further into her world of mystery; doubt; or even vagueness if you will, by creating works that are again multi-layered but that partake of new themes. Kyriazi’s new works again hover between reality and the questionable world of the tortured poet’s existence. At times her subject matter consists of old abandoned houses with neglected gardens that seem to be touching upon the bittersweet memories of old Greece while at others she seems to be playing with shadow and light. Only there’s nothing simple or playful about depicting light and shadow as anyone with a background in art will tell you. The shading that Kyriazi produces here is sublime in its values creating soft monochromatic differences. Kyriazi’s images are vestiges, hints, traces, scintilla between concealment and insight. In her recent series Kyriazi deals with the interaction between her means photography and printmaking, the digital and analog. Her previous series entitled Final Domicile begun in her New York studio, offered her the opportunity to develop this relationship. In the Final Domicile series she depicts a cemetery and gravestones printed and developed on sand paper a medium imbuing these works with a dreamy effect recalling the past. At the same time, these works seemingly about death and dying can be seen as romantic tableaus in which the idea of “bittersweet” resides along with its memories. Each individual gravestone can be read as representing the division between our lives, lived within collective society and our final journey taken alone.