Velychko Gallery presents new Kyriaki Costa exhibition

Velychko Gallery in Limassol presents MURMUR kairos, a solo exhibition by Cypriot artist Kyriaki Costa showcasing a new body of work comprising sculpture, embroidery and painting. Running throughout October, November and December, the exhibition departs from the idiom “canary in the coal mine” to speak about the murmurs heeding a response at such a decisive time. Coined in the early 19th century, the expression stems from coal miners relying on caged canaries and their heightened sensitivity to toxic fumes to alert them to evacuate before suffocating. This is why the expression has been used to denote either an event or a person who signals oncoming danger. The instrumentalisation of the canary in the mining industry also raises questions about how certain systems dictate which bodies get to live or die first, who is sacrificed and who is made to suffer so that others may continue to live unharmed. Costa questions the imbalances between messengers, exposure and responsibility, and chooses sentinel species to narrate stories of entanglement. On the other side of the proverbial coal mine tunnel, ants excavate to build worlds based on sufficiency instead of excess. Although ant nests remain largely invisible to humans, they can undermine the integrity of infrastructure that once appeared immovable. The artist chose to weave and carve ants into her works partly as a cheeky nod to the discovery of an ant colony living behind the gallery walls during renovation works, and partly as a serious invitation to recognise their sophisticated, almost alchemical systems of cooperation, as a helpful and hopeful metaphor for choreographing resistance even at a minor scale – and to listen even if the voices are ‘small’. MURMUR kairos Exhibition by Kyriaki Costa. Curated by Denise Araouzou. October 9-December 15. Velychko Gallery, Limassol. Opening night: 5pm-9pm. Open during Limassol Art Walks. By appointment 96-855580. www.velychko.gallery