The cultural summer of Naxos opens with an exhibition by Nikos Moschos at the Bazeos Tower, commencing on June 26. The exhibition serves as the prelude to the established Naxos Festival, held annually during the summer months at the 17th-century listed monument in the island’s hinterland, in Agiassos.

A total of eighteen works—both recent and earlier—on loan from private collections and the Zoumboulakis Gallery, have been brought together for the exhibition Animated Connotations. The presentation also includes two sculptures by the artist.

According to art historian Francesco Piazza, Moschos’ painting, with its distorted human forms, machines, and musical instruments compressed into a unified whole, “strikes the senses like a blow to the stomach or a flash in the eye. It hypnotizes and numbs, destabilizing memory and perception alike.” He further notes: “If contemporary painting today witnesses a return to representation at the expense of abstract and conceptual art, this is owed to artists such as Nikos Moschos, who shape their vision through a new representational idiom—unpredictable, charged with dramatic and mature symbolism. His modular visual narratives disrupt the stillness of the canvas, compelling the viewer’s perception to animate the images observed, to construct new associations, and simultaneously to engage with universal archetypes through his personal artistic language.”

The exhibition Animated Connotations, curated by Marios Vazeos, will remain open until September 26. The Naxos Festival is held under the auspices and with the support of the Hellenic Ministry of Culture.