Zoumboulakis Gallery presents the new solo exhibition by Achilleas Papacostas, titled Ideal condition. Achilleas Papacostas shows work that's representative of the past five years, oils on linen, wood, and paper.

At the centre is the ongoing battle between subject and painting medium. Dreamlike, enigmatic images shift the subject drastically, while also remarking upon the relationship between mankind and nature, artificial space and natural landscape, and the ceaseless roaming of the solitary man in an unfamiliar place.

In the works shown, the subject ceases to exist as protagonist; it becomes the mechanism that organises the painterly means: Achilleas Papacostas doesn't paint the subject but uses the subject in order to paint. The works bring out a distinctive personal style, where chromatic tones, strict boundaries, clear intentions, synthetic balances, rhythms and counterpoints function appeasingly. The reading of the works is free of bold tonal contrasts, as well as of any noise and fragmentation, for the purpose of preserving a healing image.

Achilleas Papacostas (b. 1970, Athens) is a graduate of the Thessaloniki School of Fine Arts and the Athens School of Fine Arts (ASFA), under the tutelage of P. Tetsis and R. Papaspyrou. He continued he studies on a scholarship by the Alexander Onassis Foundation, at the École Nationale des Beaux Arts in Paris, under professor Μ.V. Velickovic. His work has been shown in numerous museum group exhibitions and international art fairs, such as the Benaki Museum, the Onassis Foundation, the Foundation of the Hellenic World, Art Paris and Art Athina, In Greece, he has been awarded the First Prize of the Jannis & Zoe Spyropoulos Foundation (1995), the Ministry of Culture “Melina Merkouri” Award (1998), and the Academy of Athens Award for new painters under the age of 40 (2004), and in France the Grand Ρrix of the Paul Louis Weiller competition by the Ιnstitut de France (1997). He has been represented by the Zoumboulakis Gallery since 1996. He lives and works in Athens.