THE METAXI COLLECTION
Τὸ Μεταξύ is a series of works that explores identity and self-perception in the aftermath of injury, focusing on the complex and often disorienting process of healing and recovery. The series stems from a deeply personal experience and from the prolonged period of anárrosi (ανάρρωση)—a process that is often understood as a movement towards restoration, but which, in reality, can be fragmented, unpredictable, and filled with states over which we have little control.
Healing is not experienced solely through the physical body. It unfolds simultaneously on emotional, psychological, and physical levels, each progressing at its own pace and often in conflict with the others. During this period, I experienced a profound disconnection between my mental and physical states. There were moments when the mind was ready to move forward while the body resisted, and others when the body appeared capable while the mind remained exhausted, fearful, or uncertain. The simple acts of everyday life—moving, standing, walking, working, sleeping, or completing familiar routines—could suddenly acquire an entirely different meaning. Some changes were temporary; others altered my perception of myself more permanently.
This disruption inevitably raises questions of identity. Who am I when my body no longer behaves as I expect it to? How much of who I understand myself to be is defined by what I can physically do? What happens to identity when ordinary gestures and routines become unfamiliar? And when the boundaries of the body change, do the boundaries of the self change with them? The works emerge from these questions rather than attempting to provide definitive answers. They examine the uncertain territory between the person I was, the person I believed myself to be, and the person I was becoming through the experience of recovery.
At the centre of each work are two human figures. They represent the same individual, divided into two interconnected yet frequently opposing selves: the physical self and the mental self. Their relationship is neither one of simple opposition nor complete separation. They exist in constant negotiation, sometimes moving together, sometimes pulling apart, and sometimes appearing to occupy entirely different emotional and physical realities. The space between them becomes the conceptual μεταξύ—the threshold where identity is questioned, reconstructed, and gradually redefined.
This duality reflects the experience of recovery itself. The two figures may be understood as conflicting forces, but they are also dependent upon one another. Neither can fully exist without the other. The physical body carries the visible evidence of experience, while the mental self carries its emotional and psychological consequences. Between them lies an unstable middle ground: a space of frustration, vulnerability, resistance, acceptance, adaptation, and, ultimately, reconciliation. The objective is not necessarily for the two selves to become identical, but to find a new equilibrium in which both can coexist.
The works also examine how identity is shaped through the seemingly insignificant details of daily life. Routines that once existed unconsciously become suddenly visible when they can no longer be performed in the same way. A movement, a gesture, a journey, a task, or a familiar rhythm can become a reminder of physical limitation, while simultaneously challenging the assumptions through which we construct our sense of independence and selfhood. These small disruptions accumulate, creating a gradual transformation in the way the individual inhabits and understands their own body.
Colour plays an important role in articulating this psychological tension. The palette is often vibrant, luminous, and seemingly joyful—colours that might conventionally evoke pleasure, optimism, calm, or vitality. Yet their interaction produces an underlying sense of unease. Colours collide rather than harmonise; competing hues occupy the same space, resist one another, and at times appear to demand attention simultaneously. The result is a kind of silent noise: a visual intensity in which nothing is literally audible, yet everything seems to be speaking at once.
This chromatic tension reflects the internal experience of recovery. The colours may appear happy, but happiness and distress are not mutually exclusive. Hope can exist alongside fear; strength alongside vulnerability; acceptance alongside frustration. The apparent brightness of the works therefore does not resolve their darker emotional undercurrents. Instead, it creates a deliberate contradiction between what the viewer initially perceives and what the work gradually reveals. Colour becomes a psychological language through which conflicting emotional states coexist within the same visual space.
Within Τὸ Μεταξύ, the body is therefore neither simply a representation of physical existence nor merely a vessel for psychological experience. It becomes the site where the two intersect. Injury disrupts the assumed unity between body and self, exposing a relationship that is normally invisible because it functions without conscious attention. Recovery makes that relationship visible.
Ultimately, the series is concerned with the uncertain territory of becoming. It asks whether identity remains stable when the conditions through which we recognise ourselves change, and whether recovery means returning to who we were or learning to inhabit a new version of ourselves. Τὸ Μεταξύ exists within this unresolved space—not quite between illness and health, past and present, body and mind, limitation and freedom, but within all of them simultaneously.
The space between the two figures is therefore not empty. It is where the experience takes place. It is the space of negotiation, transformation, and self-recognition—the space in which the physical and mental selves encounter one another and begin, however imperfectly, to find a way forward.