Lot 58: Gianna Persaki (Greek, 1921-2008) Little girl with toys 121 x 76 cm.

Little girl with toys
signed in Greek and dated '1950' (lower left)
oil on hardboard
121 x 76 cm.

Exhibited:
Athens, Epipeda Gallery, Retrospective 1947-84, 22 April-18 May 1985, no 3.

Committed to abstractive tendencies as early as 1947, Persaki produced vibrant and dynamic canvases in which familiar landscapes, objects and figures, including her daughter Eva, were gradually transformed into colourful patchworks of solid shapes and simplified forms.υ1 As noted in the 'Epitheorisi Technis' journal, her work is distinguished by clear-cut, frugal and well-structured designs further pronounced by her flat treatment of colour.υ2 In Little girl with toys, she focused on colour relationships and the geometric structure of pictorial space to produce a sensitive and engaging piece, which emanates a sense of joie-de-vivre and a deep and hard-won feeling of truthfulness. As the artist herself once said "art is a tough game to play."

υ1. C. C(hristou) in Dictionary of Greek Artists [in Greek], vol. 4, Melissa publ., Athens 1999, p. 26.
υ2. C.G., Epitheorisi Technis journal, no.11, November 1955, p. 428