Costas Varotsos
° 1955
Born in Athens (GR).
Costas Varotsos
Studied painting at Rome’s Academia di Belle Arti (1973-1976) and architecture at the Arte Scuola di Architettura in Pescara where he attended lessons by Giorgio Grassi. Even from his first works in Italy - mainly performances and sculptural interventions - Varotsos starts to express an interest in space. In 1982 he abandons his degree in architecture and returns to Greece where he realises his first solo exhibition at the Desmos gallery, entitled Spacial Intervention in Nature: Deterioration. From then on, he focuses exclusively on sculpture. He uses transparent materials, such as glass, plexiglass, water, but also steel or stone in order to create works with a social and symbolic character. He is especially interested in the communicational and emotional impact of the work on the viewer.
Gradually his interest turns towards works and syntheses for public spaces via which he attempts to explore the human relationship between the natural and man-made environment.Within this framework, in 1988 he creates The Runner for Omonia Square. In 1989 he becomes a founding member of the artists’ group Realismi. In 1991 professor and art theoretician Achille Bonito Oliva organizes the artistic group Transavanguardia Freda, in which Varotsos also participates. In the same year he is awarded with a Fullbright Scholarship and moves to New York for a year.
His works have been shown internationally in solo and group exhibitions (Sao Paulo Biennale, 1987, Costas Varotsos, Macedonian Museum of Contemporary Art, Thessaloniki, 1990, Venice Biennale 1995, 1999, Beijing Biennale, 2003, ARCO, Madrid, 2004, Costas Varotsos: “Future Through the Past”, Benaki Museum, Athens, 2007 et al.).
