Annita Apostolidou Platis | Barbagelata Contemporary Art Foundation
A dialogue between dreams, imagination, and transformation unfolds through original literary prose and selected artworks from Into the Unwritten.
The international art book DREAMS, published by the Barbagelata Contemporary Art Foundation on 30 October 2026, brings together sixteen selected artists whose creative practices explore the shifting boundaries between dreams, imagination, memory, and artistic expression.
For Greek visual artist and writer Annita Apostolidou Platis, the publication represents a meeting of two interconnected dimensions of her creative practice: visual storytelling and literary expression.
Selected as one of the publication's sixteen featured artists and officially credited among its five contributing writers, Apostolidou Platis participates through an original prose work and a dedicated six-page presentation of four artworks from her ongoing series Into the Unwritten.
The publication also includes an independent curatorial essay written by the Barbagelata editorial team, offering a philosophical and psychological interpretation of her visual language.
Dreaming into Becoming — A Literary Journey
Appearing in the opening section of the publication, Dreaming into Becoming is an original prose work by Annita Apostolidou Platis that explores the delicate territory where memory, imagination, and transformation converge.
Rather than approaching dreams as an escape from reality, the text considers them as spaces of possibility—places where familiar perceptions dissolve, inner landscapes emerge, and new understandings of identity begin to take shape.
Through a reflective literary language, Dreaming into Becoming extends the symbolic universe of the artist's visual practice beyond the image, inviting readers to contemplate the relationship between dreaming and becoming.
The prose appears on pages 4, 6, and 7 of the publication, while the artist is formally acknowledged in the editorial masthead among the book's five contributing writers.
This literary contribution reflects an important dimension of Apostolidou Platis's multidisciplinary practice, in which writing and visual art operate as complementary forms of expression.
Into the Unwritten — Four Artworks, Four Inner Thresholds
The visual presentation, featured on pages 18–23, introduces four selected works from Into the Unwritten, an ongoing series that reinterprets familiar literary narratives, cultural archetypes, and symbolic imagery through a contemporary surrealist language.
Rather than illustrating traditional stories, the series transforms their recognizable elements into psychological landscapes where memory, vulnerability, self-discovery, and transformation intersect.
The four featured artworks trace different stages of an inner journey.
Awakening
An ornate doorway suspended between cloud and earth becomes a symbolic threshold between the familiar world and the possibility of another reality.
Surrounded by shifting mirrors, impossible architecture, and the silent presence of a lion formed from clouds, Awakening reflects on courage, imagination, and the willingness to move beyond inherited perceptions.
The work suggests that transformation begins not with physical movement, but with the capacity to envision another way of being.
The Weight of Small Things
Drawing upon the symbolic memory of The Princess and the Pea, this composition explores emotional sensitivity and the invisible burdens carried beneath appearances.
An embroidered tower of pillows, a solitary figure, and a suspended pea construct a dreamlike environment in which comfort and vulnerability become inseparable.
The work considers sensitivity not as weakness, but as an essential human capacity through which empathy and compassion can emerge.
Restarting
Inspired by the symbolic universe of The Little Prince, Restarting presents a sleeping figure embracing a rose beneath a glass dome, accompanied by a fox and surrounded by celestial fragments.
The composition explores renewal, meaningful connection, and the responsibility inherent in new beginnings.
Here, transformation is not simply the discovery of another world, but the conscious decision to shape that world through love, trust, and compassion.
The Wisdom of the Crane
Inspired by the Japanese folktale The Crane Wife, this work explores identity, reciprocity, freedom, and the transformative power of kindness.
A solitary woman, a crane, suspended spheres of thread, and an antique sewing machine inhabit a symbolic landscape where memory and creation become inseparable.
The threads suggest the continuous weaving of identity, relationships, and future possibilities, while the crane embodies patience, resilience, and the quiet wisdom of self-knowledge.
Together, these four works reveal a visual narrative in which dreaming becomes an active process of questioning, choosing, and becoming.
A World Still Being Sewn — An Independent Curatorial Perspective
The six-page artistic presentation is accompanied by the dedicated curatorial essay Annita Apostolidou Platis: A World Still Being Sewn, written by the Barbagelata Contemporary Art Foundation's editorial team.
The essay approaches the artist's work through its symbolic, psychological, and philosophical dimensions, examining the relationship between imagination, identity, and the possibilities of transformation.
Of particular interest is the editorial team's engagement with the philosophical perspectives of Ernst Bloch and Adriana Cavarero.
These references offer a broader intellectual context through which the visual narratives may be considered, connecting questions of possibility, human identity, and becoming with the symbolic structures of the artworks.
Rather than imposing a definitive interpretation, the curatorial discussion opens further possibilities for reflection on the artist's visual language.
The accompanying editorial perspective also highlights the relationship between the familiar and the unexpected—a recurring characteristic of Into the Unwritten, where recognizable stories are reimagined as contemporary psychological and emotional landscapes.
Between Image and Word
The relationship between Dreaming into Becoming and Into the Unwritten extends beyond their shared thematic interest in dreams.
Both emerge from an artistic practice shaped by symbolism, mythology, memory, and the exploration of identity.
In the visual compositions, doors, mirrors, animals, celestial objects, and suspended architectural elements become metaphors for psychological states and personal transformation.
In the literary work, similar concerns unfold through language, allowing the reader to encounter the emotional and philosophical territory that informs the images.
Together, the two forms of expression create a dialogue in which neither illustration nor explanation takes precedence.
Instead, image and text invite different ways of experiencing the same underlying questions: how identity is formed, how memory shapes perception, and how imagination allows new possibilities to emerge.
DREAMS — An International Dialogue
Through its combination of visual art, literature, and editorial interpretation, DREAMS brings together diverse creative perspectives on one of humanity's most enduring subjects.
For Annita Apostolidou Platis, participation in the publication marks another chapter in an evolving multidisciplinary practice, bringing her original literary writing into direct conversation with her contemporary visual work.
Her contribution reflects a continuing interest in the transformative potential of imagination—not as a departure from reality, but as a means of reconsidering the world and our place within it.
DREAMS Art Book 2026 was published by the Barbagelata Contemporary Art Foundation on 30 October 2026.
Explore DREAMS
Discover DREAMS Art Book 2026, published by the Barbagelata Contemporary Art Foundation, bringing together contemporary visual art, literature, and the imaginative worlds that connect them.
Explore DREAMS — Digital Edition
Discover the Series: Into the Unwritten — Annita Apostolidou Platis
Annita Apostolidou Platis
Visual Artist · Curatorial Essayist · Fashion & Jewelry Designer
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