COOPER COLE is pleased to present, Firm Like Water, an offsite solo exhibition by Serapis. This exhibition is curated by Magdalyn Asimakis and is in collaboration with Mason Studio and the 2023 CONTACT Photography Festival.
Serapis is an Athens-based multidisciplinary collective that takes its inspiration from water—oceans, seas, their slippery matter, and their interaction with human-made infrastructures. Describing their practice as a “multimedia ocean-themed novel”, the collective’s interest in expanding and exceeding boundaries constitutes an interdisciplinary output across art, design, and fashion. Their fascination with water acts as an extension of this liquidity; their watery subject matter spills across media.
Photography is central to Serapis’ work. Found and created images of water, ships, workers, and maritime bric-a-brac are recurring motifs throughout the collective’s artwork, exhibitions, and clothing, seamlessly flowing between disciplines without material boundaries. This interdisciplinary practice acts as a meditation on the artificiality of borders and the structures that attempt to interact with the unfixed nature of water.
Firm Like Water embraces the ethos of Serapis. Leaning into the malleable boundaries of the collective’s works and subject matter, this exhibition presents photography in a number of atypical registers: images printed on myriad textiles mix found imagery, technical shipping photography, with photos taken by the members of Serapis for artistic and editorial purposes. These pieces weave together vistas of maritime narratives from multiple perspectives and pull them into unusual spaces.
This exhibition takes place at mason studio located at 91 Pelham Ave. in Toronto, with hours between 10am-4pm, Monday through Saturday, from May 12 – July 1, 2023.
Serapis is a hybrid art, design and fashion collective which creates work inspired by the aura of the oceans and the industries related to the sea. It aims towards an expansion of the boundaries of artistic production and distribution and functions like a multimedia ocean-themed novel. This results in a human centric narrative which takes place inside the universe of the sea but is instilled by an intense spirituality throughout its imagery and references. This artistic production can also be read as a contemporary seascape. Serapis have exhibited at galleries in across Greece, Italy, and Lebanon including Hot Wheels Athens, Seamanship of Lagkada Cultural Space, ARCH Athens, SECCMA Trust, Rodeo Gallery Piraeus, Centro Pecci (Tuscany), and GB Agency (Paris). They also have created the public art projects ‘Untitled’ at Vigla of Pachi in Chios, and ‘Liquid Soul’ through Rodeo Gallery in Piraeus. Their fashion works can be found online.
Magdalyn Asimakis is a curator, writer, and researcher based in Toronto. Her practice explores embodied experience in relation to Western display practices and methods of knowing. She is the co-founder of the curatorial collective ma ma, and is currently the Executive Director of Images Festival.
