The Girl and the Unicorn

“Art is the connection of the heart.” – Eleni Vassiliou-Asteroskoni

In the quiescent of her workplace successful Fürth, Germany, Eleni Vassiliou-Asteroskoni paints worlds not simply to beryllium seen, but to beryllium remembered. Painter, poet, writer and educator, she moves fluidly betwixt forms, moving with the content that creation should beryllium lived with arsenic overmuch arsenic it is looked at.

Originally from Piraeus with Cretan roots, Eleni has spent much than 2 decades creating, exhibiting, and teaching. Her archetypal solo amusement was successful 2001 astatine the Municipal Theatre of Piraeus, and since then, her enactment has recovered its mode into galleries, museums and nationalist collections from Crete to Tokyo. Her palette is affluent with fantasy, representation and folklore. But she’s ne'er strayed acold from reality. Instead, she uses it arsenic the introduction point.

“Art kept maine beardown erstwhile everything other seemed fragile,” she tells me. “The symptom of nonaccomplishment turned into spot and a committedness to proceed creating, honouring my roots, and sharing my imaginativeness with the world.”

One of her astir meaningful projects began with her illustrated children’s publication ‘The Girl and the Unicorn’, a communicative inspired by the resilience she witnessed successful children undergoing crab treatment. During her unpaid enactment astatine the Marianna Vardinogianni Children’s Hospital successful Athens, she would overgarment with the children, listening to their stories and witnessing moments of spot wrapped successful fragility. It was determination the quality of Lefki was born.

“The unicorn became a awesome of hope. It was nary longer conscionable a mythical carnal – it became light, presence, comfort,” she says.

The proceeds from the publication went toward gathering woody unicorn-shaped libraries, present housed successful paediatric oncology clinics successful Greece and Germany. These aren’t ornamental. They’re built to beryllium touched, explored, used. Shelves filled with books, places of quiescent encouragement.

“I wanted to springiness them thing lasting,” she says. “A spot not lone for stories, but for strength.”

Installations see the ELΠIDA Children’s Oncology Unit successful Athens, the MITERA Paediatric Oncology Centre, the PGΝT AHEPA successful Thessaloniki, and the Klinik Hallerwiese successful Nuremberg, created successful collaboration with section schools and Greek assemblage associations. Each is simply a carnal continuation of the story’s tone – stories and symbols occupying existent space, offering thing tangible to children and families successful fragile moments.

“In the eyes of a suffering child, the airy they comprehend is power. A trembling airy I strive to clasp onto.”

Her transportation to the children she meets doesn’t extremity with a visit.

Eleni has besides painted murals successful shelters and schools, including the 2nd Greek Primary School of Nuremberg. These works, vibrant and layered, blend mythical figures with humanities relation models. They’re designed to spark curiosity.

“When I paint, I strive to represent some fantastical heroes and large personalities who person shaped our world,” she says. “I privation children to recognize that greatness, kindness and contented tin travel from anyplace – adjacent from them.”

Recognition for her enactment includes a taste grant from UNESCO Piraeus and Islands, acknowledgements from the Ministry of Education and Culture of Cyprus, and literate prizes for some poesy and children’s literature. Her publication ‘The Girl and the Unicorn: Victory’ was included successful the 2021 Educational Material Catalogue of the Republic of Cyprus. She besides participated successful the “Be My Hero” campaign, which registered 30 caller bony marrow donors.

Her books person been translated into aggregate languages including German and Braille, and her literate catalogue spans poetry, theatrical works, comics, and children’s stories. Her poetic works see ‘Forgotten Fairies’, ‘The Crack’, ‘Angels’, and ‘Aretousa’, galore of which were archetypal performed oregon launched successful taste venues specified arsenic the D.I.P.E.T.H. Chania Theatre.

Now based successful Germany for implicit a decade, Eleni continues to thatch coating to children and teenagers, and she’s preparing for her archetypal solo accumulation successful Germany, ‘Between Fairies and Romance: Parallel to Another World’, opening successful 2026. The accumulation volition harvester paintings and poesy successful a mode that invites the spectator to dilatory down, measurement inside, and enactment a while.

“It volition beryllium a reflector of my interior world,” she says. “A abstraction of beauty, emotion and imagination.”

At the aforesaid time, she’s adapting the ‘Lefki’ communicative into a manga (a Japanese-style graphic novel), a mean she believes volition assistance transportation the connection to caller audiences.

“The imaginable for storytelling done movement, dependable and colour is boundless,” she says. “It’s a earthy adjacent step.”

“My societal endeavours present person flourished, arsenic I person not lone reached the Greek assemblage successful Germany but besides carried my connection acold beyond the borders of Europe. My paintings person adorned galleries successful the United States and Japan, wherever they person touched hearts, stirred emotions, and sparked the spirits of radical from assorted cultures.”

Her connection has ne'er changed. Her work, whether connected paper, canvas oregon wall, is astir connection. It’s astir remembering who we were arsenic children and recognising the moments, nevertheless small, erstwhile we felt seen.

“Through love, creation and kindness, we tin emergence supra adjacent the darkest moments,” she says.

And supra all, I anticipation they retrieve with grace
That once, a fairy passed done clip and space.
She near down colour and words truthful bright
In a satellite that had mislaid its warmth and light.
She scattered stardust, a acquisition to the night…

Eleni Vassiliou-Asteroskoni

Eleni doesn’t telephone herself a change-maker. There are nary headlines oregon declarations. But if you travel her communicative intimately – crossed hospitals, schools, galleries, and pages – you’ll find a quiescent thread of impact.

Just similar stardust, scattered quietly.

Learn much astatine https://asteroskoni.wordpress.com/

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