Magoni Despo (1943)

She was born in 1943 in Athens. She studied fresco and icon painting at the Athens School of Fine Arts, under Y. Moralis and K. Georgakopoulos (1962-67). She has an MFA in painting from the New School for Social Research in NYC, where she has been living and working since 1968. At first she worked as a graphic designer until 1974, when she dedicated herself to painting. She presented her first solo exhibition in Athens (Rotunda art gallery, 1973). She has also illustrated books.
She is a representational painter of anthropocentric subjects, with an emphasis on female form. Her work is dominated by a distinctive narrative style, full of mythological/historical references, closely associated with a post feminist approach towards contemporary social issues and conflicts. Her expressionist style is often of a violent and distorting nature. Occasionally, the descriptive elements of her compositions subside, giving way to a more abstract artistic approach, depending on the expressive needs of each one of her thematic units.
She has presented more than twenty solo exhibitions, mainly in New York and Athens. She has participated in many group exhibitions, including 2 Pan-hellenics (Athens, 1973 and 1975) and various thematic exhibitions (Icarus Odyssey, MoMa- Mexico, 1979; Visual Politics, Alternative Museum-NYC, 1982; Three generations of greek women artists, The National Museum of Women in the Arts-Washington D.C., 1989; Revision/the human image, Pratt Institute Gallery-NYC, 1990 etc.).
In 1974, she was awarded the gold medal at the International Festival of Painting and Graphic Arts of Saint Germain Des Pres (Paris) and the 2nd Prize in a group exhibition devoted to Pericles Byzantios (Athens). BRIC's Contemporary Art (Brooklyn, New York City) made her Artist of the Month in 2011.