Antonis Donef

“Time”

Time is something relevant. I personally cannot identify time within the three-dimensional reality which we live in and are perceived. Time is a fourth dimension in addition to the spatial dimensions: height, width, and length. Humans cannot perceive this dimension, but they can feel it through emotions and senses. Time consists of past, present, and future and this is the effect I always try to achieve through my work, implementing a more structured focus on an art piece.

My new series of art projects started three years ago, with a collection of sketches that I found myself drawing randomly, wherever I was at the time. For the first time, no emphasis on conformation, just painting with materials I had to hand, wherever I was, inspired by my surroundings.

After much considered thought, I decided to bring all the sketches together to create one piece of art. Structure and a topic focus were not the key elements of the initiation of this series.  I think this was brought about more by my conscious awareness of the absence of ‘time’ in previous art pieces, which has always concerned me, as they could sometimes take up to two years to complete.  The increase of even more colour into my projects, I believe has played an important role in engaging more diverse emotions for the viewer, making it more uncomplicated to perceive time through the artwork, which is my intention with this series.

Since the birth of my son, Christoforos – Maximos, almost every art piece has a small contribution from him included within my work, as he works on his art alongside me, being the shadow of myself, and in some way a form of my continuation in life.   It is all our responsibility to encourage the next generation of young people to be creative and productive. Even the simplest material or a child's sketch can bring something unique into every piece of artwork as proven in this new project series. We must motivate young people to understand that we are all accomplished enough to create something meaningful, and with passion, commitment, and determination it is always possible.  With this perspective in mind, I hope my new projects will inspire and encourage young people to create without trepidation.

We would like to express our sincere thanks to the Donef family for their very kind gift to our school, which will be part of St Catherine's heritage for the next generation and beyond, and will add color and vibrancy to the children's daily school life. Enjoy more photos in the gallery below and we look forward to sharing this fabulous piece of art  on our main staircase of the Upper School when the time is right for you all to start visiting us again.