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30-06-2026 – AKI Finals: the past, present and future
Lana Amira: @lanamirart and www.lanamira.cargo.site
Nikolina Karoulla @nico_thedoodlemakerart and www.nikolinakaroulla.art
Dahyun Lyu unknown
Caroline Schot @caroline.schot and www.carolineschot.com
The AKI finals are always among my favourite times of the year, where you can see the artists and designers of the future, and what’s on their mind right now. This year there appeared to be a strong return to analogue, with a lot of woodworking, fabric, painting, analogue photography and more. I visited twice, although the Opening Friday visit was a bit too warm for my liking. On Monday, with the weather much nicer, I returned with hopes to talk with some of the artists.
The first person I spoke with was Lana Amira, a Fine Art graduate with stunning paintings that mix photography, cyanotype and classic painting. Amira talked about how you freeze/ kill a moment in photography, and she aims to bring it back to life with painting, at the same time abstracting the work. One of the paintings was an easy read: a forest, maybe the reflection of one. The next one featured mountains, which I only saw once I realised that the forest was well—a forest. Another painting was a deep, dark blue, and if you looked hard you could see the original clouds. Talking with Amira, you meet someone who loves what she does, and is eager to experiment with her concept in the future, maybe with double exposure—she said. The paintings felt dreamlike to me, almost ethereal. I’m very curious about what work she’ll make in the future.
The second person I spoke with was Caroline Schot, another Fine Art graduate. Her exhibition took place in a dark room. A lone slide-viewer is the first thing you encounter. If you look through it, you’ll see the photo of a man standing by a car: Schot’s father, who passed away before she really got to know him. Walking a bit further, the darkness truly sets in, and you watch the projections of photographs Schot’s father took. They’re projected onto water, which then reflects on a sculpture and the wall. The sculpture is human like, with a light emitting from inside. It obscures part of the photographs on the wall. For Schot, this project allowed her to feel a bit closer to her father, though she also says that at a given moment, the project becomes a project, and there is an emotional distance. She says that sometimes, when she sits in the dark watching the photographs, the emotions do return. Her plans for the future include a master in kunsteducatie.
Nikolina Karoulla was the third graduate I got to meet, also Fine Art. She is a Greek Cypriot. Her pieces are about the memories, specifically about the people lost during the Greek Cypriot conflict, people she knew directly or via others. The memories slowly fade, though she doesn’t want them to. She used mixed media: painting, print making from photographs, and pastels. The most striking piece to me was ‘The people war erased’, where her mixed media and concept beautifully comes together. Prints of people, facial features mashed together, because the memories slowly fade, these people fade. Their bodies were never found. The cross in the centre of the work, Karoulla explains, shows how the church tried to make people think it was okay that there weren’t any bodies to bury. In the centre of her space was an installation of printed fabric, hanging from the ceiling, overtop of lavender. Within the lavender, which was a mix of old and new, there are empty spaces. Some of the empty spaces are filled with the favourite flowers of the people who died.
Karoulla also included the memories of both of her grandmothers, noting how interesting it was the way they differed in how they remembered things. One grandmother seemed much more linear than the other.
Karoulla also included the memories of both of her grandmothers, noting how interesting it was the way they differed in how they remembered things. One grandmother seemed much more linear than the other.
Dahyun Lyu I didn’t get to meet. She’s a Moving Image graduate and made a film using cyanotype titled “Home, After”. Overtop the blue film, memories are poetically narrated. I felt that this piece fit wonderfully with the other three artists in this blog post. There was a sense of nostalgia, memories I understood, memories I didn’t, which is what makes people so interesting to me. Unfortunately there is little more I can add about this work at this point in time. I cannot find her work on the AKI website, and there were no business cards near the film room. The work felt dreamlike and ethereal, much like the other works featured in this blog post.
Many congratulations to all the 2026 graduates.