Indigenous Habitat

about Petros Chrisostomou

As a product of Globalization, born in London, 1981, to Cypriot parents, and now living in New York, Petros Chrisostomou explores the idea of the indigenous habitat, by creating boxes from which to work in, and juxtaposing these items to form connections and disconnections. They become symbolic metaphors for a decentralized notion of where we find ourselves culturally grounded, and the spaces that we relate to as home.

The environments chosen to present these objects tell a story — through a lucid observation of Brooklyn’s subcultures — and link a thread throughout the geographical and social connotations of these works.

Petros’s works transcend that postmodernist trope of the simulacrum, offering distinct traces of the skewed realities of the Dadaists or fantasies of the Surrealists — you can see an “ejaculation” made of two pomegranates and a flower pot or a “wasted youth” represented with some giant eggs occupying a whole kitchen cupboard.

Petros was a resident on the International Studio and Curatorial Program, New York, as well as the winner of The Red Mansion Art Prize, where he worked for a concentrated period of time in Beijing, China. His work has been included in public and private collections worldwide.