London-based guest curator Gelly Gryntaki highlights the work of Jen Power, Kotaro Machiyama & Trendafila Trendafilova
About Gelly Gryntaki
I am a feminist, an art curator, critic and writer, a mother, a reader and a translator. I am interested in queer and gender identities, posthumanism, science and science fiction and engaged in feminist and human rights movements.
My research focuses on contemporary art creation as a multi-dimensional space where all those fields intersect and interact, offering a new world and self-perspectives.
I have a multi-disciplinary background with a BA diploma in Physics, an MA in Art Conservation and a PhD combining Physics with Literature and Contemporary Art.
I have worked as an independent contemporary art curator, translator, art critic, and writer for several institutions, media, and artists.
I am a regular contributor to The Greek issue of The Art Newspaper and the Greek online culture magazine .
I live and work in London. My website is .
Kotaro Machiyama’s Plastic Abstraction
What characterizes Kotaro Machiyama’s paintings is striking materiality. Although undefinable, his “objects” seem ready to get out of the canvas. There is a sense of livelihood, a joyful plasticity that brings the paintings somewhere between pop art and abstraction.
Despite their non-representational nature, though, they open conceptual doors to elusive narratives. They could be details of a toy or a bright coloured industrial product, a futuristic landscape or even an expressionistic depiction of a body part.
Machiyama’s pallet keeps some apparent pop qualities. His imagery seems to have vague origins in Nicholas Krushenick’s enigmatic forms and Lichtenstein’s use of the comic strip. However, his game with volumes and empty spaces gives his work the very individual identity of what I would call plastic abstraction.