John Bizas Greece, b. 1980

John Bizas (Greece) felt drawn to the visual arts in his youth and soon began to focus on sculpture. He graduated from the Academy of Fine Arts in Carrara and has worked for Damien Hirst, Jan Fabre, Louise Bourgeois and many other famous artists.

He currently sculpts in marble and has developed his own techniques and approaches to working with stone. In 2008, he expanded his activities outside Greece and established a studio in Pietrasanta, Italy. He now has additional studios in Chios, Greece, and Washington, DC.

He regularly participates in exhibitions in Europe and the US, and his works are included in private collections around the world. In 2015, one of his sculptures was chosen as one of the ten best contemporary artworks of the year and exhibited at the Cologne Art Fair in Germany.

John's traditional background in the visual arts provides a strong aesthetic and technical foundation that allows him to explore and push the physical and visual boundaries of his subject matter.

His approach gives equal importance to the space occupied by the stone and the negative space of the work, adding an interdimensionality to his work. Thematically, his work confronts the viewer with the complex and urgent issues facing the contemporary world.

Much of John's art is intended to draw attention to the more painful and destructive elements of contemporary civilisation. His work is generally executed in marble, but he also combines stone with composite or other materials. In his artworks, he seeks to exploit and expose the creative and physical possibilities of the various materials.

His work is a response to the unprecedented explosion in the technological, material and economic sophistication and complexity of human life. This transformation has come at a high price. The costs are clearly visible in economic inequality, environmental destruction and the ongoing tragedy of permanent war in our global village.

Although he realises that the current situation is precarious, he hopes that by confronting the difficult issues raised in his art, the viewer will be inspired to think and take action to create a better world.