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currently represented in Melbourne Australia, by

Zac Koukoravas is a contemporary visual artist

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Zac Koukoravas graduated from the Victorian College of the Arts in 2012. In 2016 he won the Best Artist Award at DenFair and in 2014 held a successful sell-out debut at the Melbourne Art Fair. In 2013 Koukoravas won the FLG’s Emerging Artist Award and held his first solo exhibition with FLG in 2014. His work is represented in the Justin Art House Museum (JAHM) Collection and has featured in various JAHM's group exhibitions over recent years. His works are held in private collections nationally.

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ARTIST CV

Born 1975 in Melbourne Australia, Lives and works in Melbourne

 

Education

2012 Bachelor of Fine Art (Painting), Victorian College of the Arts, University of Melbourne

2009 Diploma of Visual Arts, North Melbourne Institute of TAFE

 

Solo exhibitions

2023 High Fade: Flinders Lane Gallery

2021 Homemade Weapons: Flinders Lane Gallery

2019 Mixed Messages: Flinders Lane Gallery

2017 Blue Lines: Flinders Lane Gallery

2016 Supermodified: Flinders Lane Gallery

2014 Visualised: Flinders Lane Gallery

2013 Flora Mirificus: c3 Contemporary Art Space, Abbotsford Convent

 

Selected group exhibitions

2022 Art &Gender: JAMH

2019 30x30: Flinders Lane Gallery

2018 Subterrain: Flinders Lane Gallery satellite exhibition at Collins Place Gallery

2018 Black & White and Red all over: JAHM

2018 Translation 1: Tidal Space Gallery

2017 Denfair: Melbourne Exhibition Centre 

2016 Fuse: Flinders Lane Gallery

2014 Render: Screen Space

2014 Perceptions of Space: Justin Collection, Glein Eira Gallery

2013 Exploration 13: Flinders Lane Gallery

2012 Proud 2012: Margaret Lawrence Gallery

2012 VCA Grad Show: Margaret Lawrence Gallery

2012 50 Shades of White: Student Gallery, VCA

2011 Proud 2011: Margaret Lawrence Gallery

2010 Mixed Treasures: Student Gallery, VCA

2010 Proud 2010: Margaret Lawrence Gallery

2009 Bound, Artist's Book Show: Eltham Library Community Gallery

2009 Eviction: Fitzroy Street Gallery 2009 Graduation Show: A Space Gallery, NMIT

 

Awards

2016 Denfair Best Artist Award

2013 Flinders Lane Gallery Emerging Artists Encouragement Award

2013 Sofitel Art Room Series (shortlisted)

2012 David Teleskivi Memorial Sculpture Prize

2012 Orloff Family Charitable Trust Award

2012 John Vickery Scholarship

2009 Dean’s Art Award

 

Invited talks

2016: Fuse artist talk with Owen Craven

2013: invited speaker at the ‘Art and Arch’ public lecture as part of Process, the Victorian Young Architects and Graduates Network public lecture

 

Bibliography

2018 Art Collector Magazine 83 pp.112-113

2014 Catalog Essay for 'Render" : Simone Hine, Screen Space

2014 The Age, Entertainment: Art and Design, Review by Robert Nelson

 

Collections

Justin Art House Museum 

 

ARTIST CV
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Catalogue Essay | Excerpt

Dr Elizabeth Bodey

Koukoravas’ large scale works, painted on multiple layers of glass and perspex, are characterized by his use of shadow and light, depth and space. Layering additional panels to create further complexity and depth, Zac imposed strict parameters on his creative process, finding infinite possibilities within set limitations. Conflicting elements of chance and structure, movement and stillness result in works full of peaks and plateaus, structure and composure - the outcome of gambling with the dichotomy of order and chaos.

Embedded within Zac’s abstract painting practice are a diverse range of pictorial traditions and cultural experiences including graffiti, architecture, the electronic music scene, political activism and our relation to natural and urban environments. Colour and form, appropriated and deconstructed from the surrounding environment, play a key role in the aesthetics of the work.

His is a hard/soft-edged, intriguing dialogue of piercing forms, yet possessing an atmospheric quality created by a sfumato effect that draws us into potent spaces in and around the painted surfaces. The overlapping directional shapes, the materials used and the application of paint by airbrush suggest a sense of fragmented soundwaves in deep space and of the ‘far away’, as if pointing to the future. Texture is denied. Surfaces are smooth and screen-like, and within these forms there are suggestions of the physical presence of another, more tenuous world.

As with many artists, materials and processes formulate the entrance to these ‘other’ worlds. Koukoravas’ works consist of layered sheets of glass and acrylic, painted on both sides, suspended within a darkened interior frame. By purposefully using a limited range of enamel and acrylic colours, the meticulous shapes within his compositions are delicate, floating as if in a space both microscopic and vast. They permeate a sense of mystery. Traditional brush marks and textures are absent in this conversation of contrast: sharp and soft, opacity and transparency. Pellucid forms both emerge and recede, shifting focus from background to foreground and back again.

 

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