Romancing The Myth

at Barbara Davis Gallery, Houston, Texas

Mavromatis makes the dresses out of a range of materials that further evoke the interpersonal. Much of the artist’s work derives from her own impressive technical skills — especially in cyanotype and monotype — but these are sometimes combined with materials culled from her mother’s linen heirlooms. Relatedly Mavromatis uses coffee filters throughout the exhibition (and indeed her entire oeuvre), which as with the heirlooms provoke a sense of familial connection that derives from her experiences listening to storytelling, secret sharing, and communing in general that took place so often around a pot of coffee in her family. The visceral feelings of friends, family, and memory called up by the coffee filters and heirlooms provoke something not opposite to satire — a distanced critique — but perhaps its necessary ally — a bodily sense of connection.

Philip Kelleher Glasstire, October 13, 2024