Cynefin Athens - Κινέβην Αθήνα

07/07/2026

Please join us for closing reception drinks at Cynefin Athens on Thursday 9th July from 8 till late! All welcome! Alison Jones' solo show; IT IS THE OLD FACE UNDER THE NEW FACE, curated by Maria Toumazou, continues Thursday through Saturday 11th July. Gallery opening hours 4-8pm or by appointment.

Cynefin Athens | Κινέβην Αθήνα
Lefkosias13
Plateia Amerikis
Athens 11252

25/06/2026

Alison Jones' solo exhibition; IT IS THE OLD FACE UNDER THE NEW FACE, curated by, and in conversation with, Maria Toumazou, is extended until July 11th! You have three more weeks to come visit this wonderful show and collaboration at Cynefin Athens!

17/06/2026

https://www.bovary.gr/culture/must-watch/old-face-behind-new-face-ekthesi-alison-jones?fbclid=IwdGRjcASfZYpjbGNrBJ9lfGV4dG4DYWVtAjExAHNydGMGYXBwX2lkDDM1MDY4NTUzMTcyOAABHsQt_8-H7mKB15J6RcH634suAPrs3nXkIR43rhdhun3k5Li9IRt2Uf69japS_aem_7vh-C_OD02Me6zIuJGa8eQhttps://www.bovary.gr/culture/must-watch/old-face-behind-new-face-ekthesi-alison-jones?fbclid=IwdGRjcASfZYpjbGNrBJ9lfGV4dG4DYWVtAjExAHNydGMGYXBwX2lkDDM1MDY4NTUzMTcyOAABHsQt_8-H7mKB15J6RcH634suAPrs3nXkIR43rhdhun3k5Li9IRt2Uf69japS_aem_7vh-C_OD02Me6zIuJGa8eQ

Στη γκαλερί Cynefin Athens στην Πλατεία Αμερικής, η έκθεση της βραβευμένης βρετανίδας εικαστικού Alison Jones βλέπει πίσω και πέρα από την κατασκευασμένη λάμψη της μόδας, διερ....

08/06/2026

Cynefin Athens is delighted to welcome American artist and educator Alexandria Smith to the gallery for her June residency and upcoming solo exhibition. Smith was born in the Bronx, New York and earned her BFA in illustration from Syracuse University, New York; An MA in art education from New York University; and MFA from Parsons The New School.

Through her practice Smith addresses issues of identity informed by autobiography, fiction, myth, collective memory, and history. Combining figuration and abstraction, her works imagine hybrid figures comprised of limbs, eyes, breasts, and hair in distinctive configurations that embody physical, emotional, and metaphysical growth and transformation. Working across various mediums, the artist makes drawings with collage elements, paintings with sculptural assemblages, and immersive installations.

Smith was a public and charter school art teacher in Harlem and the South Bronx for over a decade. She is the recipient of many awards, fellowships and residencies such as the Queens Museum/Jerome Foundation and Fine Arts Work Center Fellowships, Skowhegan, MacDowell, Yaddo and LMCC residencies and a Pollock-Krasner Grant. Her work has been exhibited nationally and internationally, and is in many public collections such as The Studio Museum in Harlem, Mt. Holyoke College Art Museum, Longlati Foundation and the K Museum of Contemporary Art. Smith lives and works in New York, and is Director of Undergraduate Studies in Studio Art and Assistant Professor in Painting and Printmaking at Yale University in New Haven, Connecticut. Alexandria’s most recent solo exhibition entitled, “in this here place, we flesh” was held at David Castillo Gallery in Miami, FL.


Images courtesy of the artist:

1. dust on my tongue, jeering of my breath. 2024. Mixed media on three-dimensional wood assemblage. 52 x 63 x 3.5

2. a velocity of being. 2025. Mixed media on three-dimensional wood assemblage.
60 x 67 x 2.5

3. a transparency of belief. 2025. Mixed media on three-dimensional wood assemblage.
72 x 60 x 2.5

IG:

30/05/2026

Opening tonight from 7pm!

Alison Jones

IT IS THE OLD FACE UNDER THE NEW FACE

Cynefin Athens is pleased to present a solo exhibition by Alison Jones, the culmination of her three-month residency at the gallery. The artist will present new paintings and additionally revisits early projects and past publications, selected and re-staged by artist Maria Toumazou.

The title of the exhibition is taken from Martha Rosler reads Vogue, 1986, a video work where social distinction is conveyed through aspirational editorial language that links identity to consumption. Jones has been preoccupied with the embroilment of art and luxury, fashion and class, since a student at the Slade in the 80s. In IT IS THE OLD FACE UNDER THE NEW FACE she presents vignettes on canvases — active scenes instilling material culture being looked at. The pieces are reworked in variations while implicating existing artworks and their surroundings, engaging with the paradigms of labour and appropriation.

A section of IT IS THE OLD FACE UNDER THE NEW FACE includes Maria Toumazou’s restaging of Subtle Abyss (first made by Jones as a student), and a selection of collaborative artists books by Alison Jones and Milly Thompson; VUOTO and C21st Recent History.

Alison Jones (b 1962) is an artist working in London. She studied at Slade School of Art and Goldsmiths University of London. She is a painter of art and luxury, fashion and class, working with the entanglement of the female gaze in depictions of art and showing off that draw attention to, but also wilfully confuse a commentary on femininity and spectatorship.

Maria Toumazou (b 1989) is an artist working in Nicosia, Cyprus. She completed her BA Art Practice at Goldsmiths University of London, MFA at Glasgow School of Art and Städelschule Staatliche Hochschule für Bildende Künste. Her work is predominantly sculptural, though exploring other disciplines and perspectives as an artistic practice is focal.

Cynefin Athens
Lefkosias 13
Plateia Amerikis
Athens 11252

Opening Reception: Sat May 30th, 7 - 11pm
Exhibition: 30/05/26 - 21/06/26
Opening hrs: 4 - 8pm Thurs thru Sat
Or by appointment

25/05/2026

Opening this Saturday. Cynefin Athens is pleased to present a solo exhibition of current artist in residence, Alison Jones.

For IT IS THE OLD FACE UNDER THE NEW FACE, Alison Jones presents new paintings and additionally revisits early projects and past publications, selected and re-staged by artist Maria Toumazou.

The title of the exhibition is taken from Martha Rosler reads Vogue, 1986, a video work where social distinction is conveyed through aspirational editorial language that links identity to consumption. Jones has been preoccupied with the embroilment of art and luxury, fashion and class, since a student at the Slade in the 80s. In IT IS THE OLD FACE UNDER THE NEW FACE she presents vignettes on canvases — active scenes instilling material culture being looked at. The pieces are reworked in variations while implicating existing artworks and their surroundings, engaging with the paradigms of labour and appropriation.

A section of IT IS THE OLD FACE UNDER THE NEW FACE includes Maria Toumazou’s restaging of Subtle Abyss (first made by Jones as a student), and a selection of collaborative artists books by Alison Jones and Milly Thompson; VUOTO and C21st Recent History.

Alison Jones (b 1962) is an artist working in London. She studied at Slade School of Art and Goldsmiths University of London. She is a painter of art and luxury, fashion and class, working with the entanglement of the female gaze in depictions of art and showing off that draw attention to, but also wilfully confuse a commentary on femininity and spectatorship.

Maria Toumazou (b 1989) is an artist working in Nicosia, Cyprus. She completed her BA Art Practice at Goldsmiths University of London, MFA at Glasgow School of Art and Städelschule Staatliche Hochschule für Bildende Künste. Her work is predominantly sculptural, though exploring other disciplines and perspectives as an artistic practice is focal.

Image:
Alison Jones, ‘It is the Old Face Under the New Face’, 2026, oil on canvas, 30 x 30cm

IG:

20/05/2026

Alison Jones

IT IS THE OLD FACE UNDER THE NEW FACE

Cynefin Athens
Plateia Amerikis
Athens
11252

30th May - 21st June 2026
Opening Hours: Thurs thru Sat 4 - 8pm
Opening Reception: Saturday 30th May 7 - 11pm

Cynefin Athens is pleased to present a solo exhibition of current artist in residence, Alison Jones. For IT IS THE OLD FACE UNDER THE NEW FACE, Alison Jones presents new paintings and additionally revisits early projects and past publications selected and re-staged by artist Maria Toumazou.

The title of the exhibition is taken from Martha Rosler reads Vogue, 1986, a video work where social distinction is conveyed through aspirational editorial language that links identity to consumption. Jones has been preoccupied with the embroilment of art and luxury, fashion and class, since a student at the Slade in the 80s. In IT IS THE OLD FACE UNDER THE NEW FACE she presents vignettes on canvases — active scenes instilling material culture being looked at. The pieces are reworked in variations while implicating existing artworks and their surroundings, engaging with the paradigms of labour and appropriation.

A section of IT IS THE OLD FACE UNDER THE NEW FACE includes Maria Toumazou’s restaging of Subtle Abyss (first made by Jones as a student), and a selection of collaborative artists books by Alison Jones and Milly Thompson; VUOTO and C21st Recent History.


Alison Jones (b 1962) is an artist working in London. She studied at Slade School of Art and Goldsmiths University of London. She is a painter of art and luxury, fashion and class, working with the entanglement of the female gaze in depictions of art and showing off that draw attention to, but also wilfully confuse a commentary on femininity and spectatorship.

Maria Toumazou (b 1989) is an artist working in Nicosia, Cyprus. She completed her BA Art Practice at Goldsmiths University of London, MFA at Glasgow School of Art and Städelschule Staatliche Hochschule für Bildende Künste. Her work is predominantly sculptural, though exploring other disciplines and perspectives as an artistic practice is focal.



Image:

Alison Jones, ‘It is the Old Face Under the New Face’, 2026, oil on canvas, 30 x 30cm

IG:

06/04/2026

Revisiting VUOTO - an artist’ book / luxury magazine published by Alison Jones and Milly Thompson (2012)

VUOTO, (Italian – empty: vuòto) comprises projects by Alison Jones, Josephine Meckseper, Martha Rosler, Milly Thompson, Nicole Wermers and an ‘editorial’ by Nina Power, and was conceived as simultaneously a high-end self advertisement, and an examination of the conditions of art through feminism, distinction, luxury and glamour.

Alison Jones’ project in VUOTO is a feature on private collections titled ARTHOUSE. The text is a collage of journalism taken from the Art and Culture sections of magazines and is paired with the artist’s ink paintings of art in luxury homes.
Our current artist in residence at Cynefin Athens, Alison Jones, is developing new work and revisiting pre-existing ones, in dialogue with with Cypriot artist Maria Toumazou.

Alison Jones' solo exhibition opens May 30th.

24/02/2026

Cynefin Athens is delighted to announce current artist in residence, Alison Jones, in dialogue with Cypriot artist Maria Toumazou. Their dialogue will culminate in a solo presentation of Jones’ work at Cynefin Athens in April 2026, dates to be announced soon.

Alison Jones is a painter of art and luxury, fashion and class, and the condition Bourdieu describes as ‘Distinction’. Reveling in painting’s ideological muddledness, and taking pleasure in its guilty status as luxury art object par excellence, her paintings pose in the slippery space between desire and critique. Self-described as “institutional critique in f**k-me shoes”, Jones works with the entanglement of the female gaze in depictions of dressing up and showing off that draw attention to, but also willfully confuse a commentary on femininity and spectatorship.

As well as painting, Alison Jones has made books, posters, performances and curated exhibitions most notably in collaborations with the late Milly Thompson, which erupted between 2010 - 2016 for periodic thoughts on, and reassessments of feminism.

Alison Jones & Maria Toumazou

Alison Jones was Lecturer in Fine Art at Goldsmiths, University of London 2008 - 2023 where she met Maria Toumazou, then a student. They talked a lot about the methodology, politics and humour of the artist Martha Rosler. Whilst their practices appear entirely dissimilar, they share an obtuse gaze with the intention of noticing and highlighting "nefarious ideological operations" behind everyday visual culture.

Alison Jones and Maria Toumazou will be collaborating on an open-ended project, which will develop during the time Alison is in residence at Cynefin Athens.

Image:
Alison Jones. 'Leon Golub, I’m a Fan’, 2025, oil on canvas
240 x 150 cm

photo credit is Benjamin Deakin

_____________________

Born near Blackpool, Lancashire, Alison Jones studied at the Slade and Goldsmiths, and currently lives and works in London. She has shown internationally, and her work is held in public collections including Bankers Trust, Goldsmiths, the Granada Foundation and UCL. Recent projects include Turning Pages: Artists Books of the Present, MAK, Vienna, Supastore Now!The Art of the Deal, London, Blusher, Leicester University Gallery, Magic Mirror, Hydra, The Look, Transition Gallery, London, Cubitt 30, at Victoria Miro Gallery, London and John Moores Painting Prize 2021.

Maria Toumazou is an artist and curator working in Nicosia, Cyprus. She completed her BA in Art Practice at Goldsmiths College and MFA at Glasgow School of Art. She is the co-founder of the publishing imprint MARIA†. Editions based in Nicosia and New York and a founding director of Neoterismoi Toumazou (Neo Toum), an artist-led space showcasing emerging local and international artists in Nicosia.