Constantine Hlyvlias

The heroes of the “Portraits” project talk about their state and experiences by painting a self-portrait with black acrylic on glass, which helps them explain the unexplainable, turn to their subconscious and depict the painful or long-fictional. I'm interested in working with different characters, communicating with them about their emotional state, the excitement they are experiencing, helping them to tell about themselves in a broader way than the usual portrait photography.

I capture two portraits in one art photo. The first – is the character, the second – is their condition. I remove any possibility of being dishonest with the photograph, with me or the viewer. One photo can take several hours to create in an attempt to understand the subject, or himself, it goes through our dialog, something that remains intimately ours, and the photo remains the final point of this long reflection around my question "Who are you?

Sublimation - In psychology, sublimation is a mature type of defense mechanism, in which socially unacceptable impulses or idealizations are transformed into socially acceptable actions or behavior, possibly resulting in a long-term conversion of the initial impulse.

Sublimation is a sign of maturity and civilization, allowing people to function normally in culturally acceptable ways. He defined sublimation as the process of deflecting sexual instincts into acts of higher social valuation, being "an especially conspicuous feature of cultural development; it is what makes it possible for higher psychical activities, scientific, artistic or ideological, to play such an 'important' part in civilized life.

It is for the artist that this becomes a powerful catalyst for creativity, thanks to which the sublimation of their own existential fears and concerns occurs, which begin to be visualized in deeply psychological images.

About attentiveness and tenderness. We created this series in completely polar states, and this truthfulness is the reason behind the project. Inside us, sameness and difference are concentrated in proportion, we are at an emotional distance, or in such proximity that it forms a dense form, to which I gave the name "vase". There are many such states, and together we form a physical form that tells both our individual and shared stories.