The Historical Archive-Museum of Hydra continues to showcase the work of foreign artists residing in Hydra, hosting from April 1st to May 25th, an excellent artist, Mary Gladstone, who travels us to Hydra with her wonderful weavings and embroidery, or knitwear.
Mary Gladstone is the living personification of the love for Hydra, which you can always see in the eyes and in the hearts of almost all foreigners who have lived on our island for years and honor us with their presence and action.
Born in England, where Mary spent her childhood, she decided in 1974 to come to our country and has lived permanently in Hydra since the 1990s.
Skillfully possessed of the way of teaching and methodical transmission of knowledge, while living in Athens, Mary taught for 11 years artistic courses at the British School of St. Catherine, which was initially located within the English Embassy in Athens.
However, her great love of art and her willingness to devote herself exclusively to it, led Mary to make the decision to give up education permanently. Arriving shortly after in Hydra, in her effort to solve her immediate livelihood problem, she dealt exclusively with the delivery of watercolor lessons and, at the same time, delivered English language lessons to interested parties.
Today, apart from the watercolors she continues to paint, she has been creating for years a peculiar, extremely beautiful, and interesting art form with impressive works, woven and embroidered, knitted, or all three together in combination, made exclusively with vegetable threads dyed with her own care from various plants gathered from Hydra and other places.
The life of Mary Gladstone, Our Mary, is interwoven mainly with the nature and beauty of her colors, and her experienced artistic eye investigates each time and mixes these colors, alternating and matching perfectly aesthetically the dark browns with the greys, ochres, yellows, oranges, blues, pomegranates, and reds, creating with her own seal a globally exciting language of visual works on braided or woven substrates of particular touch, color, and shape.
The symbolic titles of the works in the exhibition entitled Perspectives on Hydra always refer to its central theme, which, as the title says, is none other than Hydra’s beloved, its magical atmosphere, landscapes, life, and people. Hills, mountains, seas, chapels, festivals, dances, and conversations in Hydra neighborhoods, all blend into a wonderful artistic ensemble that always praises Mary Gladstone’s favorite place, revealing her experiential bond with it.

Exhibition opening: Saturday, April 29, 2023, at 8 a.m.

Hours of audience visits: daily, 9 p.m.–4 p.m.
Information: www.iamy.gr,
Email: [email protected]
Tel. 2298052355