Koukoumavla - Despina Melianos
artist
Despina Melianos, our Despina or as she is better known, Mrs Koukoumavla! In the Patmian dialect, Koukoumavla is called the Owl, but this is an expression that is used rather metaphorically, for example when we want to say that someone is saying something untrue, something imaginary. Then we say for example: don’t say Koukoumavlas!
That’s what her grandmother called her, because from a young age Despina created fairy tales, or more correctly, she recreated with her own vivid imagination the fairy tales and stories with which both her grandmothers, the one from Hora and the other from Thassos island, bombarded her! Since then, she has kept this nickname, “Koukoumavla”, because as she likes to say, it allows her to move and live under the saying “Lies and truth, so they say the fairy tales”!
The red thread of fairy tales has been constantly unraveling in Despina’s life since then, as in a way she herself lives in a perpetual fairy tale that is transmuted everywhere around her and in everything she crafts, composing the unique style that makes her stand out. You enter her shop and suddenly you find yourself in another dimension, the dimension of Koukoumavla, with its exaggerated bodies and oversized eyes, with its bright colours and patterns imprinted on all kinds of objects and constructions. As she says, fairy tales are a consolation, they are a great refuge for her and it is no coincidence that in recent years, in addition to spreading her fairy tale education wherever she finds herself and wherever she stands, she herself has been studying the art of storytelling, developing her knowledge and skills.
Koukoumavla considers herself to be an airy person – a characterization that is often attributed to her by the people, probably somehow scathing, as she adds with a smile. But she, as an airy person, considers herself to have much greater sensitivity and insight, and also being in a closer relationship with nature in general.
Obviously this same sensitivity and her endless love for children are behind her special family, which is no less than four wonderful daughters!
Trying to approach the persona of Koukoumavla through a few lines is not an easy task. Does her torrential personality conceal a Despina who never grew up, or is it a proof that the unconventional can be very real and perfectly functional? In any case, interacting with her can be a whole experience. But it’s essential to allow your authenticity interact with hers, which is special, very sensitive and ultimately highly moving.
Koukoumavla and its “little shop of miracles” are located in Hora, in the old market.
