My art profiled on Belgian TV channel BRUZZ by master of the documentary art Anja Strelec.
My favourite part is how she caught my funky hair waving in the wind like a bug’s antennae!
Production: BRUZZ TV
Directed and filmed: Anja Strelec
Today we lost someone who fought against fascism and oppression his whole life.
A Greek national hero, Manolis Glezos first inspired the Resistance by tearing the Nazi flag down from the Acropolis with his bare hands.
We met him here in Brussels where he was still working to fight against, you guessed it, fascism and oppression.
Glezos passed away today.
He lived an incredible life, fierce and filled with humour too. Today we are especially quiet and sad locked in our homes, observing social distancing as per the global crisis that feels funereal most days anyway.
I’m so grateful to have met a hero. To have had him over for tea. To have witnessed the energy that it took to be a force of humanity for as many years as he gave and gave and gave.
He inspired me to make two portraits of him and inspires me to keep giving too.
I made this sketch when Manolis Glezos visited us. I hope you can see his compassion and magnetism in the connection he shared. This was long before the oil portrait he gave me permission to paint which I shared and wrote about here:
https://tamarlevi.com/2015/09/10/manolis-glezos-portrait-in-the-method-of-rubens/.
I hope when this global health crisis is over we can travel again to Apiranthos, his village on the highest mountains on the island of Naxos where the hardiest fighters are buried.
A quick video, just a minute from my speech at the European Parliament’s Feminist Forum with reactions & testimonies from viewers.
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=uNNAnRnvRpI
Below you can find the text from the short video and credit to all the people involved.
Tamar Levi – Artist:
You know who these women are!
Somebody cooked your meals
Somebody wiped your bottom
Somebody cleaned your house
Everyone on these walls is someone who has worked for others
They may not be famous
They may not be familiar
But they should be celebrated.
They are the invisible labour made visible.
The style that I apply is the continuous line style I don’t lift my brush off the paper I don’t lift my pen off the paper I work in one continuous line Some journalists have called it The Single Line Method.
To me it’s about continuity.
I want to dedicate this entire collection
To my grandmother
She passed away this week…
She taught me to fight for other women
And fight for my education…
Sandra Pereira – GUENGL MEP – PCP – Portugal:
We would like to thank Tamar Levi for this exhibition.
It was really a very good idea. And it was a great contribution to the event. The event became richer because of the pictures, because of her explanation of the images. It was really really good to have you here. Thank you so much.
Ewa Espling – Politician – Activist – Sweden – Vänsterpartist:
It was absolutely the exhibition I wanted to see! And the theme of the exhibition about us women Together, and how we depend on each other It was incredibly beautiful. Went straight into my heart. Thank you!
Tamar Levi – Artist:
This is Women’s Day 2020 & “20/20” in English means “Clear Vision” So for you here today These are 20 visionary women For Women’s Day 2020 Thank you!
Video: Vasileios Katsardis/Olivier Hansen
Les Femmes et La Revolution Event Organiser: Charlotte Balavoine
Curator: Green Door Gallery
Artwork: Brush & Acrylic Black Ink, Watercolour Paper
Portrait References: Sarah Levi, Grandmother, Teacher, Union Representative Dalia Aviv Levi, Sister, Aunt Grace Ketty Cardon, School Founder & Director Bhushavali Natarajan, Parent, Friend, Eco-Fashion designer & Heritage Travel Blogger Vaia Vaena and Christina, Friend, Parent, Lawyer Linguist & The Future Meghan Sinnott, Lifelong Friend Elena Kountoura, Member of European Parliament, Parent, Former Minister of Tourism, Model & Athlete Christina Abood, Mother, Friend, Mirth-maker, Lawyer Joana Xhemali, Feminist Killjoy & Stop Gap Child Care Provider Athanasia Katsigianni Sandra Hodzic, Friend, Parent, Journalist Naomi Lee Gal Gal Porat, Cousin, Friend Dr. Vanessa Katsardi, Sister-in-Law & Professor of Engineering Aneta Safaryn, Friend & Home Keeping Support Helen O’Sullivan-Tyrrell, Artist, Friend, Curator Ahu Yigit, Parent, Friend & Photographer Margaret Joyce Sweet, First Time Great-Grandmother, Women’s Land Army (WWII) & Timber Corps Anna Giannopappa and Chryssa, “Koumbara” (Best Woman in Greek Tradition), Parent, Friend Athanasia Delistamati, Evgenia Delistamati & Tova Niovi Levi Katsardi, Cousins Reading “Goodnight Stories for Rebel Girls” Dr. Bona Selimaj, Paediatric Doctor, Parent, Friend Giannoula Katsigianni, Great-Grandmother, Resistance Member, Business Enterprise Founder Eliza Sfyra, Dancer, Book Lover, Engineer, Godmother Michele Lalić, Parent, Friend, Nonprofit Professional Nina Lucija Lalić and John Larimer, The Future & Her Grandfather Beata Szypcio, Friend, Parent, House Keeper Support Silvia Anna Ratzersdorfer, Friend, Co-Author, Art Historian Sofia Sereti, Child Care Provider, Friend Mathilde Borcard, Therapist, Trauma Activist, Body Worker, Community Builder Athanasia Katsigianni, Grandmother, Mother-in-Law, Business Director Konstandinka Kouneva, Friend, Parent, Former MEP, Union Leader, Disabilities Activist Solly Elstein, Fairy Godmother, Fairy Goddaughter, Linguist, Global Citizen Sarah Ironside, Be Kind, Be Happy Eleana Ziakou, Friend, Parent, Literary Translator Efthimia Eleftheria Fotou, Friend, Child Care Support, Policy Maker
Panel Speakers:
Ewa Espling, Politician, Activist, Sweden, Vänsterpartist Sandra Pereira, Eurodeputee, Portugal, Coordinatrice FEMM pour GUE-NGL Sira Rego, Eurodeputee espagne, Vice-presidente de la GUE-NGL Saliha Boussedra, Docteure en philosophie d l’universite de Strasbourg Francoise De Smedt, deputee Bruxelloise, membre de la commission femmes du PTB Jule Goikoetxea, Professeure a l’Universite du Pays-Basque Pernando Barrena, eurodepute du Pays-Basque Pierrette Pape, directrice d’Isala, coordinatrice de #GenerationAbolition, Belgique Maite Lonne, survivante, autrice, militante, Belgique Pascale Rouges, survivante, militante, Belgique Marie Merklinger, survivante, militante, Allemagne Anne Darbes, survivante, autrice de “Le Visage de l’Autre,” France Malin Bjork, eurodeputee, Suede Anne Mejias De Haro, Juriste, syndicaliste CGT Carine Rosteleur, infirmiere, secretaire regionale CGSP sur le mouvement des “Blouses Blancs” Belgique Alba de Vincente Barbero: greve generale en Espagne le 8 mars. Oihana Etxebarrieta, membre du Parlement autonome basque Notopoulou Aikaterini SYRIZA, deputee, region de Thessalonique Irini Agathopoulou Member of Parliament, SYRIZA Concert Manou Gallo- la reine de l’Afro Groove
Due to popular demand my ‘Great Minds’ art exhibition has been extended at the Green Door Gallery (21, Rue Murillo, Brussels 1000, Belgium)!
Updated schedule:
11-4pm Today 26/3, Thursday 28/3, Friday 29/3, Saturday 30/3 and Sunday 31/3 2-6pm, as well as by private appointment by contacting the Green Door directly through their website: www.greendoorbrussels.com.
In the meantime, checkout a short clip from opening night on 22/3.
You are warmly invited to the inaugural exhibition of a new art gallery in Brussels! My artwork represented in “the smallest gallery w the most gravitas” in Brussels: THE GREEN DOOR.
I will be exhibiting my continuous single-line portraits of the greatest minds in history; philosophers, authors, poets, scientists and scholars at The Green Door Gallery.
“The human being behind the written word inspires me on a visual level! I paint a lot of Philosophers! I celebrate Poets, Activists, Feminists, Revolutionaries and Folklorists. Their characters, identities, histories. The nature of their individual natures. The condition of their human condition as they express the complexity of the human condition. These micro-level personal dynamics are undercurrents we engage with deep inside their often meta-level literature. Then, they time travel! We bring these great minds forward from history and apply their ideologies to our thinking, the macro-level application to our everyday lives. Their characters are simultaneously private and public. Private to us as their thoughts inspire our fundamental actions, thus ever contemporary and present tense. Public as deeply foundational to this world which their cultural contributions have already historically shaped. Their portraits are both solid persons, and symbolically thematic. Their image belongs on our walls as they are akin to family that have made us. We relate to them. They form our world, they are our people.”
Tamar Levi
Schedule
Friday, March 22, 2019
6:00 PM – 9:00 PM (Opening drinks reception – please rsvp)
Saturday, March 23, 2019
12:00 PM – 6:00 PM (Saturday opening hours)
Sunday, March 24, 2019
12:00 PM – 6:00 PM (Sunday opening hours)
