Between Light and Shadow: Art for a Sustainable Future | August 13 – September 7, 2025

apapatza
Oct 6
5 min read

Updated: Oct 7

Antonia Papatzanaki, Xylem Poplar installation, 2025 | Stainless steel, Plexiglas, LED lights

Exhibition Curators: Ioannis N. Arhontakis, Antonia Papatzanaki

Catalog essay: Christoforos Marinos

Scientific Associate: Petros Lymberakis

The Region of Crete – Regional Unit of Chania and the Chania Museum of Contemporary Art – Elaiourgeio present the exhibition Between Light and Shadow: Art for a Sustainable Future, featuring the works of two distinguished female visual artists, Antigoni Kavvatha and Antonia Papatzanaki. The exhibition takes place in two historic locations in Splantzia Square in Chania, kindly made available by the Ephorate of Antiquities of Chania.

Paintings by Antigoni Kavvatha are exhibited in the Venetian Church of Saint Rocco, while a light installation and a painting installation by Antonia Papatzanaki are presented in the Ottoman Underground Fountain of Splantzia. Through different artistic media, both artists address the urgent issue of the climate crisis, merging artistic expression with environmental consciousness in order to raise questions about humankind’s relationship with nature and the fragile balance that sustains life. Relevant activities and events will run alongside the exhibition.

Antigoni KavvathaThe profound ecological destruction caused by recurring wildfires serves both as a haunting reality and the central theme in the work of Antigoni Kavvatha. Her art reflects a deep sense of contemplation and existential concern, enriched by a metaphysical dimension. Through depictions of scorched earth, trees, and forests caught between life and death—victims of arson, lightning, and drought—Kavvatha conveys nature’s fragile equilibrium and vulnerability. Her striking black-and-white compositions, positioned between light and darkness, reality and imagination, life and death, unfold across dimensions to create a powerful dialogue between destruction and renewal.

Kavvatha’s works are exhibited in the Church of Saint Rocco, at the northwestern edge of Splantzia Square. The church, originally belonging to the Venetian Paolini family, was built in 1630, likely following a plague outbreak, as Saint Rocco was venerated as the protector of Chania against the Black Death. Its construction was completed 15 years before the city’s fall to the Ottomans, marking a period of recovery after the devastating epidemic. Notably, out of reverence and “fear of the Saint,” the Turks respected and preserved the church during their rule.

Presenting Kavvatha’s work in the historic church of Saint Rocco creates a powerful link between past and present. The site’s legacy as a refuge of hope in times of plague, functions as a symbolic space that enhances the artist’s thematic focus on ecological disaster. The space’s historical role of resilience and protection aligns with the metaphysical qualities of Kavvatha’s art, highlighting parallels between survival struggles then and now.

Antonia Papatzanaki

Antonia Papatzanaki’s recent work is inspired by biology and environmental concerns, drawing imagery from microscopy of the inner structures nature employs to create complexity and life. Her work aims to raise awareness about the vital role of plants as the foundation for ecological balance.

The installation Xylem – Platanus orientalis is based on a cross-sections of a plane tree stem us observed under a microscope, while Structural is inspired from the structures of underground life and water. Both installations are exhibited in the triple-nave space of the Underground Fountain, located in the center of Splantzia Square in Chania.

The Underground Fountain was built by the Ottomans in the 18th century, with modifications completed in the late 19th century. It is accessed via 26 stone steps, and its chamber is divided into three parts by two arches. The western wall features ornate carved masonry with cornices and pointed arches and includes a series of spouts. The fountain lies adjacent to and beneath the historic plane tree of Splantzia, which holds deep historical significance. At the beginning of the Greek War of Independence in 1821, which ended nearly 400 years of Ottoman rule, fearful of the uprising spreading to Crete, the Ottomans hanged Bishop Melchizedek Despotakis of Kissamos and Hierodeacon Kallinikos of Verroia from the plane tree on May 19, 1821, marking a somber chapter in local history.

Papatzanaki’s installation beneath the roots of the plane tree in the Underground Fountain connects the visible and invisible roles of nature in sustaining life. The installation’s blue lighting not only highlights the internal structure of the tree but also alludes to the Fountain’s past, transforming it into a poetic space that speaks both to the memory of water and the hidden pathways of life within the tree. This contemplative space invites viewers to reflect on the interconnectivity of life and the environment’s role in our shared history.

The exhibition brings together the works of Antigoni Kavvatha and Antonia Papatzanaki in the historic sites of Splantzia Square, evoking associations with nature’s fragility and humanity’s role in preserving it. Kavvatha’s exploration of ecological disaster, through haunting depictions of burned forests, resonates within the Church of Saint Rocco—a place embodying resilience and rebirth. Simultaneously, the poetic illumination of nature’s hidden structures in Papatzanaki’s work, situated beneath the centuries-old plane tree of Splantzia, prompts deep reflection on the complex links between life, water, the environment, and history.

Visitors begin at Saint Rocco, where Kavvatha’s works include a depiction of a plane tree trunk, then continue past the historic tree at the center of the square—literally beneath its leaves—culminating in the Underground Fountain to discover the tree’s interior, as revealed in Papatzanaki’s luminous pieces. This journey becomes an immersive experience, where human and natural history converge, revealing—through art—their profound and inseparable connection.

Art historian Christoforos Marinos notes in the bilingual exhibition catalogue:

“As the title of their exhibition implies, they invite us to focus on an in-between, borderline space, between light and dark, in the area where these two elements interact and coexist – just like their works. The title, however, also hints at the element of uncertainty that is characteristic of contemporary life, the sense of doubt on the planet’s future, due to climate change. The two-colour, black-and-white works of Antigoni Kavvatha and Antonia Papatzanaki convey, in the best possible way, that fragile balance, the coexistence of opposite forces, the mystery of time. In contrast to the oriental plane, beneath the burnt trees the light breeze does not stir the shadows; there is no space for the light to play. But a burnt tree doesn’t lose its beauty and will be reborn from its ashes. The life lesson we gain from trees – and that’s precisely what the two artists help us understand – is that we need them. If we want hope (the light) to beat despair (darkness) and for life on planet Earth to go on.”

The exhibition is co-organized by the Region of Crete – Regional Unit of Chania, the Ephorate of Antiquities of Chania, the Chania Museum of Contemporary Art – Elaiourgeio, with the s

upport of the Municipality of Platanias, and is part of the visual arts program CHANIaRT-2025.

The exhibition will be open daily from 8:00 PM to 11:00 PM, or by appointment, until September 7, 2025