Petros Lales Builds Worlds Through Mythology
Petros Lales, Glosolysis (2021). Archival inkjet print. Courtesy of the artist.
Petros Lales’s art is concerned with truth: seen and unseen.
An interdisciplinary artist originally from Greece, Lales moved to New York seven years ago seeking a multicultural perspective, a theme that often surfaces in his work. Lales recently appeared in Neptune in June’s show titled I Split the Dream. His installation, Eyes in Collision, envisions a world where the physical and the digital intersect and overlap.
Whether it's designing a game or an installation, the throughline in Lales’s work is his take on art-making—more concerned with active investigation than asserting so-called objective truth. He invites the viewer to join him in his inquiry, deduce what they will, and draw their own conclusions. “I don’t want to imply a general truth about something,” he says. “That's why I prefer the word investigation, something that is very personal. I search for clues and elements. It allows me to be wrong in many ways, and being wrong is part of being truthful.”
PP: What themes do you find appearing and reappearing in your work?
PL: I’m a multi-disciplinary artist, so my material ranges widely depending on the project that I'm working on, which could be paintings, installations, digital media, time simulations, or interactive artworks. The themes of my work change, but there's a flow in them. My most recent work is about mythology—how it builds character and creates a feeling of identity.
Petros Lales, Randomica Polipoda (2023). Interactive digital application. Courtesy of the artist.
PP: How do you know what format is right for a piece that you're working on?
PL: Whenever I work on a piece, I call the piece's medium “the body.” [Meeting] the body means identifying the best element through which the ideas of it can be expressed. For example, I recently created an installation piece called The Mysterious Disappearance of the Lost Eggman. The viewer is supposed to reveal what happened in this piece and uncover the lore behind it. You take the position of the investigator, and you have to go around the piece. You have to open it and see what’s inside. The experience wouldn't be the same if it were a painting or in VR, where something is completely isolated.
Petros Lales, The Mysterious Disappearance of the Lost Eggman (2023). Interactive multimedia installation, 3’ x 4’ x 7’. Courtesy of the artist.
PP: How would you describe your relationship to the digital world and technology?
PL: It's fascinating to me—not only its capabilities but also how its mechanics. I'm pretty sure there is a very good reason why someone decided to create images using algorithms, right? And they may not even be artists. There is a lot of fascination with how you can decode human/animal behaviors to do something specifically for AI. Whenever I see people being afraid of or against it, I feel it's more because of fear that they will lose their place in the world.
PP: What's your first impulse when creating a new world, digital or otherwise?
PL: I like to make prototypes—things that may or may not further evolve. Just the act of making a prototype is very interesting. My first impulses are more about feelings of discovery: how to put two things together, what's the result, or the meanings that come up. I think it's more of a psychological need: exploring and getting away from reality or the conventions in my life. I would like to experience something new. When I live my life, I feel that there must be something else that can be, something that’s out there that I want to find. It’s about a need to express myself when I see the world outside of me.
PP: Is audience something that you're thinking about? Or is it more about letting the work flow through you?
PL: I would consider myself the first viewer of a piece. I enjoy looking at it from the perspective of someone else. I want it to be something unique so it can be given to myself as well. That's why I don't always do the same things; I don't repeat myself. I want to see what else is out there. The viewer's perspective is very important to me, but in a sense of an input instead of trying to please someone.
Petros Lales, Eyes in Collision (2022). Mobile digital installation, 4 ’x 2’. Courtesy of the artist.
PP: Can you talk about your work in I Split the Dream at Neptune in June?
PL: The general themes of the exhibition were historical memory and how vision is expressed. For my piece, in the colliding eyes, we see photography manifested as a plastic flower: a technologically generated object that carries a valuable memory to the beholder. On the other camera, we see ourselves. Those two real-time images collide upon the vision of their physical form, distorting each other's digital bodies. The two generated photographs that refresh at the speed of micro milliseconds are now beyond photography and video. Their refresh rate has positioned them in the realms of reality.
PP: Do you find that the self often surfaces in your artwork?
PL: I think so. There is a game I'm making called Scots Margarita. I got inspired to make it when I first came to New York, where I found myself feeling very small inside this huge landscape of buildings and different people. In the game, you are alone and overwhelmed by the environment. I see myself through the games, but it's not my main concern. Every piece is a personal expression. It will say more about me than the subject I’m trying to discuss—and I like that. I can show my personal perspective instead of a generalization.
Petros Lales, The Time Traveler (2022). Archival inkjet print. Courtesy of the artist.
PP: How do you hope people react to your work?
PL: I hope that they will say something. I’ve observed a pattern since the beginning of my art-making: Many people will be silent because they do not understand something. I had a class at SVA where the teacher said, the art is not supposed to talk, only the viewer. But when it was my turn to present my work, no one could talk about it. I hope I can at least trigger people to react becuase it can lead later to changes and thinking.
PP: Has movement come up in your work?
PL: I think so. When I moved here, I was making work about society and how things interact. I created a lot of work with simulations or systems that build up their own world. In Greece, I was a more closed-off person, but here, I can be more open and welcoming. It was very stressful to stay, but I think if you want to do something, you will do it. Coming here was very hard; the transition itself was difficult economically without the resources. There's no singular experience.
This interview was edited for length and clarity.
Petros Lales,The Cow (2015). Paint on cardboard, 33’ x 23’. Courtesy of the artist.
