Wonders for the Ordinary: Notes for a Contemporary Wunderkammer,
16/3 - 20/5 2026
An exhibition of works by Maria Letsiou will open at Byzantine Museum of Veria on Monday, 16 March, 26 Thomaidi Street, 59132 Veria, Greece
Maria Letsiou shifts the focus from the rarity of the object to the lived experience it embodies. Starting from an initial object — a kind of object trouvé (found object) functioning as a primary "find"
— the artist creates the moulds for her works. Through their transformation into clay or painting, the forms move between the real and the imaginary, the familiar and the uncanny. In dialogue with the biomorphic surrealism of Jean Arp, Joan Miró and Yves Tanguy, the forms move between the human, the vegetal and the animal. Clay, with its cracks and traces of touch, emphasizes
the tangible materiality of the works and resists the impersonal uniformity of mass production. The color palette — pinks, lilacs, terracotta and browns, greens, blues, greys and blacks with subtle
neon accents — enhances the corporeality of the forms and creates a sense of intimacy, as if the objects were emerging from a personal memory. The installation functions as a contemporary Cabinet of Curiosities: an imaginary archaeological site
of the present, where the everyday becomes a field of discovery and the works appear as "finds" that activate the viewer's memory and imagination.
Themis Veleni, Art Historian (PhD) - Curator, Cultural Manager, Ephorate of Antiquities of Imathia
Artist's note
"In my artistic practice, I explore the sense of "wonder" embedded in the everyday — in the mundane and the humble object. I work with objects that sometimes carry personal histories and emotional weight, and at other times function simply as carriers of cultural meaning. Through their transformation with clay or painting, I give them a new life, turning them into contemporary
"archaeological findings." These objects encounter one another unexpectedly, generating stories that deliberately maintain a fertile ambiguity between truth and fiction. In this way, visitors navigate the exhibition as a space of discovery, encountering the works as fields of exploration within a contemporary Cabinet of Curiosities."Maria Letsiou, Visual Artist
Assistant Professor of Visual Arts Education in the Department of Early Childhood Education at the University of Thessaly
(+30) 23310 76100, efahma@culture.gr
Opening Hours: 08:00 – 15:00
Wonders for the Ordinary: Notes for a Contemporary Wunderkammer,
23 / 1 - 20 /2 2026
An exhibition of works by Maria Letsiou will open at Art Space Delta
(4 Chatzigiargi Street – Iasonos), in Volos, on Friday, 23 January 2026, at 7:00 pm.
The exhibition, entitled "Findings of Everyday Life – Wonders for the Ordinary: Notes for a Contemporary Wunderkammern" brings together visual works that coexist and interact within a contemporary Cabinet of Curiosities. Works from different series compose a personal, imaginary world in which objects and images connect in unexpected ways, narrating both small and large stories. Memories of childhood, play, heroes, and symbols of visual culture reappear in transformed forms, suggesting the fragile and time-bound nature of innocence. Through humor, irony, and poetry, the visitor is invited to wander through a space where nothing is exactly as it seems — a contemporary Cabinet of Curiosities that does not seek answers, but invites discovery.The exhibition will run until Friday, 20 February 2026.Opening hours:
Tuesday – Friday: 11:00–14:00 & 18:30–21:00
Saturday: 11:00–14:30
Sunday & Monday: closed, or by appointment at +30 697 818 6878
RWS Open 2024
8 - 24 MARCH 2024
The RWS Open is the largest open-submission water-media exhibition in the world, attracting thousands of submissions nationally and internationally each year.