"Olympia played a particularly important role in Polixeni's Papapetrou’s image making"

Olympia Nelson talks to SBS Greek about Polixeni Papapetrou's art, Greek language, Byzantine icons, and 3rd Gen of Australian Greeks.

Olympia Nelson at Melbourne's NGV's exhibition "Olympia: Photographs by Polixeni Papapetrou". Source: Supplied

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"Olympia played a particularly important role in Polixeni's Papapetrou’s image making"

SBS Greek

04/12/201905:23

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This exhibition comprises photographs by Australian photographer Polixeni Papapetrou (1960–2018) of her daughter Olympia, covering the period from Olympia’s birth (1997) until the artist’s death (2018). Olympia Nelson talks to SBS Greek.

In Melbourne's NGV exhibition "Olympia". Source: Suppled

The note from the National Gallery of Victoria about the "Olympia: Photographs of Polixerni Pepapetrou": 

"Polixeni Papapetrou (1960–2018) was a singular Australian artist, known for her compelling photographs that show childhood as a complex realm of imagination and storytelling. In her work, Papapetrou explored a range of stereotypes that surround childhood.

In Melbourne's NGV exhibition "Olympia". Source: Supplied

Early bodies of work considered historical archetypes and the place of children in society. Later, as her children moved through adolescence, she increasingly explored issues of identity and the individual.

Olympia Nelson (L), Polixeni Papapetrou. Source: Supplied

In the beginning, Papapetrou’s daughter Olympia was an unwitting, if willing, participant in making art with her mother, but, over the ensuing twenty years, she assumed the more active and complex roles of model and muse, collaborator, champion and child.

At the "Olympia: Photographs by Polixeni Papapetrou" exhibition launch. From left: curator Susan Van Wyk, Olympia Nelson, Robert Nelson, Solomon Nelson. Source: SBS Greek

Polixeni Papapetrou’s photographs of her daughter are deeply personal pictures, but she shared them, as artists and storytellers do, because they symbolize something in all of us."

In Melbourne's NGV's exhibition "Olympia: Photographs by Polixeni Papapetrou" Source: SBS Greek

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