Interview with Dr Elena Stylianou

Interview with Dr Elena Stylianou 

Dr. Elena Stylianou is an Associate Professor at the Department of Arts at European University Cyprus, as well as the director of the Nicosia Municipal Arts Centre (ResearchGate, 2025), which operates in collaboration with the Pierides Foundation. Her research and curatorial activities focus on the history and theory of photography, modern and contemporary art, as well as museum and curatorial practices. Stylianou has curated numerous art exhibitions in Cyprus and has co-edited several important publications on art, such as Contemporary Art from Cyprus: Politics, Identities and Cultures Across Borders (Stylianou & Demetriou, 2021), Art(ch)aelogy: Intersections of Art and Archaeology, and Museums and Photography: Displaying Death (Stylianou, 2018). Her research centers on contemporary art practices, artistic identity, community initiatives, cultural heritage, and issues of sustainability. 

Sára: So, as I read about your life and your work, I saw that you do so many things, like teach, research, curate art, and I want to ask you that, what inspires your work? 

Elena: What inspires my work? Ah, that's hard. Well, first of all, my main research interest is in photography. So, a lot of my work evolves around photographic practices in relation to contemporary art. So, I guess my main area of inspiration is contemporary art and art practices. So, that's where I draw a lot of my themes and questions for my research and also for my curatorial practice. Now, in terms of curation, because I've been the director of NIMA, which is an art center in Cyprus, showcasing contemporary art, so I was appointed director of that space. And when I took over that position, I guess my main inspiration were the art communities on the island and the fact that there were so many people who seemed not to have a voice. So, younger artists, queer, women. So, one of the main aims and the vision of NIMA, as it develops, is providing the platform for all these voices to sort of find a space. 

And at this stage, it's mainly a space for contemporary art from Cyprus. The reason is budget, really. I mean, it would be wonderful to have international collaborations as well, but funding is increasingly less than before. But I think artistic practices are my main area of inspiration. And when I go to studio visits, because I do a lot of that for my research as well, I think I get really inspired by the work that a lot of the artists are doing, because a lot of their work is research-driven and it's very much relevant to politics and economics and social issues. So, I guess that's my main area of inspiration. 

Máté: My question is about the art scene in Cyprus. So, if you would have to name one thing that is your favourite in the contemporary art scene in Cyprus, what would that be? 

Elena: I think how activist they are. I guess I'm very much inspired by them for being so active in the communities they belong. And they engage with a lot of social issues, so they raise their voices. So, I guess that's the strength of the younger generation artists in Cyprus. And also, I like the way that they experiment as well. It's not a distinction, but there is this difference, I think, between older generation and younger generation artists. And I think younger generation artists are more experimental in the way that they approach stuff. They don't necessarily care much about the final result to be too aesthetic or too pleasing or all of that. And it's more about the process and a lot of them aim to challenge structures, narratives. So, I think that's, yeah, I would say that's the strength. 

Máté: That might be similar to the Hungarian artists in here. 

Elena: Is it? That's how it is? 

Máté: It's not pleasing to your eye, but it's the message. 

Elena: I think there is, you know, it's quite vibrant in that sense. So, it makes you feel, you know, that something is happening, even if you don't know exactly what it is. 

Léda: And I was interested in if there's something exciting that you're working on right now or something that you're looking forward to. 

Elena: Well, I'm always working on something, a lot of things at the same time. I'm working at NIMAC, I'm working on a new exhibition on water. 

I just finished, we just closed down an exhibition on textile and weaving and the power of that practice. So, I'm working on preparing the publication for that exhibition. But then at the same time, I'm working on this new exhibition, which is on, as I said before, on water. 

But I'm looking into the darker sides of water, because obviously, you know, Cyprus is an island surrounded by water. Obviously, you know, that's the obvious thing to look into. But then I'm also looking at water as something that is dangerous when people cross the sea. 

You can see what happens at round or when water becomes a barrier rather than a crossing point. Or what happens when water is dark and you can't see at the bottom of the lake, for instance. So, water in relation to secrets or dark histories or difficult histories or even death. 

Or the difficult history of the island itself. Yeah, so I'm looking at that. And in general, death is some area of interest in general. 

Eleni, who presented before, mentioned that, that we're working on projects on death. But I've been interested in this concept since a very long time. How death is represented in museums, for instance, and the ethical implications of that. 

Death in photography or the death of photography is a more ontological question. Yeah, so that's a continuous area. 

Léda, Máté, Sára: Thank you very much for your answers! 

Elena: Thank you very much! 

Literature:

Stylianou, E. (2018). Museums and photography: Displaying death. Routledge. 

Stylianou, E., & Demetriou, L. (Eds.). (2021). Contemporary art from Cyprus: Politics, identities and cultures across borders. Bloomsbury Publishing. 

https://www.researchgate.net/profile/Elena-Stylianou 

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