Zisis Bliatkas
Yes, there is a “NEO-TROPICAL” theme by digital artist Zisis Bliatkas.
Yes, there is a “NEO-TROPICAL” theme by digital artist Zisis Bliatkas.
𝘼𝘾𝘾𝘼© - Computer art Auction House ©
4 min read
Zisis Bliatkas is a Greece—based artist. Zisis is a painter working with digital and traditional materials to explore ideas about humans’ relationship to technology, the vastness of space within and outside the internet, and anemia, the feeling of nostalgia for an experience one has never known. Recent solo exhibitions include Rebecca Camhi Gallery (Athens, GR) and OKAY initiative space (Athens, GR). He received his MFA from the Athens School of Fine Arts in 2022. Zisis lives and works in Naoussa, Greece.
Zisis Bliatkas's “Login Cave” artwork was selected for the first ACCA Digital Art Auction “1984”. Today, it can be seen in the 1984 ACCA Gallery and the first ACCA Auction.
Tell us a little about yourself and how you got into art.
I maintain my house and studio in Greece in my grandmother’s town called Naoussa. For the moment, I am staying in Thessaloniki as I recently started my studies for a Master of Philosophy. I grew up with pictures and was lucky to be raised in an artistic family. I also had a computer from an early age, and my fascination with video games was a decisive factor in how I got involved with digital image-making. At the same time, I was gradually “sinking” into painting (still sinking). This practice quickly absorbed my digital iconography. Working with MsPaint is a gamified way to paint, and now it has merged with my paintings.
The central concept of your art is ecology. What should it say to people and the world?
I live in an agricultural town, so the landscape is present. This greenery gets into my pictures as the overall place, the background where the events will unfold. I like how the computer screen produces such a vibrant and unnatural green. It radiates a “hyper” feeling.
How does your experience with digital art influence your daily life offline?
These lines between the two are starting to blur lately. There has been little offline life for me these last years as I am on my phone, computer, or studio painting, which is, in the broader sense, also an online practice.
What was the conception of your solo show/exhibition “Meteorology of the World” at Rebecca Camhi Gallery?
I am thrilled with this exhibition. We showed only paintings around 1,70 x 1,60 m: canvases, most of them. Meteorology was about the things that levitate above our heads: clouds, kites, suns, UFOS, or the internet. The idea of levitation is a comforting promise that things continue to exist even when they lose their objective weight. In my case, a painting can crystallize things on its surface, detaching them from everyday happenings. It is a dynamic and, at the same time, a static situation that is inexhaustibly comprehensive, which allows me to frame my subjects “openly” and with freedom.
What is your concept of your artwork “Login Cave,” which you provided for the first ACCA Auction?
“Login Cave ‘’ is a piece coming from the warmth a player feels when entering a game; in that case, it’s an MMO. I find this in-between space, a border of IRL and the virtual world. You have to ritually type your Username and Password. In this moment, you are, in a strange way, baptized again. Login pages appeal to me as quiet and mystical.
Over time, many artists’ work becomes more nuanced and less overt, however, the themes and truths remain. What starts your creative process?
I find painting is itself overt. It is revealed right in front of our eyes. So, in that sense, there is no hidden truth behind it. These kinds of paintings, even if I don’t like them at first glance, stay in my memory and prove helpful over time without me consciously choosing them. Maybe this is a creative moment I cherish when more than one person inhabits a picture.
How do you see the future of digital art and your role in it?
The future of digital art is bright. As long as our screens are open, people will keep making images and telling stories, and I find myself one of them.
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