Notes on Nelly’s

Series of photographs on archival paper, 45x30cm each, 2024

In the series of works Notes on Nelly’s, VASKOS attempt a conversation with the work of the iconic photographer of 20th-century Greece. Nelly’s images, taken in the first half of the last century, praise classical antiquities, bring the Acropolis monument to life through the ethereal sensuality of the dancer Nikolska, and capture the attempts to revive ancient Greek culture at the Delphic Festival organised by Eva Palmer and Angelos Sikelianos. In 1936 Nelly’s attends the Olympic Games in Berlin. There she meets the Minister of Enlightenment and Propaganda of the Hitler government, Joseph Goebbels, and gives him an album of her photographs of antiquities.

Despite the gloomy horizon of our times with the return of the far right, nationalism, armaments, and the strengthening of anti-woke culture, VASKOS choose to revisit Nelly’s photographs through joy, play, and light, exorcising the ghosts of the past and the fears of the present.

Difficult Shot, from the series “Notes on Nelly’s”
A Delicate Balance, from the series “Notes on Nelly’s”
Soldiers and Pearls, from the series “Notes on Nelly’s”
Pleats and Pearls, from the series “Notes on Nelly’s”
Dancing with the Columns, from the series “Notes on Nelly’s”