In this illuminating interview, Neal Rock, artist and founder of Cynefin Athens and Freeman Artist Residencies (FAR), shares the visionary mission behind these initiatives. Rooted in a deep critique of systemic inequities in the visual arts, Rock’s work prioritizes access and representation for underrepresented artists. Cynefin Athens, a hybrid residency and gallery space, fosters dialogue and community while challenging traditional gallery models. Rock discusses his inspirations, from Welsh mentorship to activist educators like Paulo Freire, and offers a glimpse into upcoming exhibitions through 2026. With passion and purpose, Rock redefines artistic practice as cultural production, blending education, curation, and creation.
Space52: Can you tell us about the vision behind Cynefin Athens and how it connects to the values of FAR? How does Cynefin aim to provide a platform for underrepresented artists, and how do you select those artists for residency and exhibition opportunities?

Neal Rock: The mission of Freeman Artist Residencies (FAR) is indebted to my formative experiences in Wales, under the mentorship of artist Michael Freeman. Freeman was teaching outside of formal educational institutions, in working-class communities, providing adult painting & drawing classes for retirees from local industry. I left Wales at 21 to attend art school in England, and subsequently became an artist with gallery representation in London, New York and LA. It’s been my experience that people working in the commercial gallery and public museum sectors (in Europe and the US) are overwhelmingly white, and from very privileged socio-economic backgrounds.
FAR began with wanting to provide a creative platform for alumni from the University of Virginia – where I currently teach – who identify as BAME / LGBTQIA+ and / or are first generation college graduates from low income families. This comes from the belief that historically and presently people have been systemically denied or restricted access to the visual arts through race, gender, sexuality and social class. FAR is a 12-month program, providing studio space, a financial stipend and international exhibition opportunities to two UVA graduates every year. Cynefin Athens | Κινέβην Αθήνα – a hybrid residency and art gallery – gives priority to artists whose values align with those of FAR, with a focus on artists who are at a more mature phase of their careers. Presently I am scheduling the projects, in consultation with a selection of Athens-based artists, into the summer of 2026. Much like FAR, I want the gallery to develop in consultation with a committee, to program and shape its direction moving forward.
S52: About your recent exhibition of Rafael Pérez Evans, how do you view his exploration of socio-political themes, and why was he chosen for this residency?

Neal Rock: Rafael’s work came to my attention through Athens-based artist Maria Georgoula, who studied with him at Goldsmiths in London. I would hesitate to thematize Rafael’s work because it’s partially rooted in a queer politics of disruption, which pushes against the kind of containment a thematic approach might often take. I understand his work holistically as overlapping cartographies that are in motion, undergoing processes of disruption. For example, his work straddles histories of Land Art, Institutional Critique, Queer body-performance and its relationship to both the embodied and the oblique. He also addresses socio-political histories of agricultural protest and community activism. In his solo exhibition at Cynefin Athens, there is a tracing and circling of these cultural cartographies, forming an indirect or discreet autoethnography – a kind of self-mapping that is rigorously anti-essentialist in the positing of a collective self as open, porous and messy. I’m particularly impressed by the way Rafael embodies some of these concerns through geometry, impermanence, and how the transient and entropic nature of objects sculpt physical space.
S52: How does Cynefin Athens work with artists from traditionally underrepresented backgrounds, and how does the program contribute to cultural access and equity, especially within the context of Greece?
Neal Rock: There have been a number of factors that have shaped the way I work with artists at FAR and Cynefin Athens. The overarching strategy is that of facilitating and prioritizing the agency of artists. This ethos stems from my upbringing in Wales and being introduced to the work of activist / educators such as Paulo Freire, bell hooks and Stuart Hall. Partially rooted in a critique of colonial / institutional power, their work aims to create more egalitarian and horizontal educational spaces, within which community has agency in how and what is learnt. For my work at Cynefin and FAR, I take a supporting role. I provide space, time and often funds for artists to produce the work they want, without commercial pressure or emphasis on product, or outcome.

I’m also motivated by the rich histories of artist-led spaces which, broadly speaking, adopt this ethos, whether it be Linda Goode Bryant and her gallery JAM in NYC during the 1970s / 80s or closer to home in Athens with Space 52. Cynefin Athens comes with its own challenges; the present and recent socio-economic conditions of Greece, whilst connected to global economic events, have played out differently than in other countries such as the UK or US. In Athens I have initiated conversations which will hopefully avoid the ‘importing’ of a gallery model that was shaped from different socio-political histories and conditions. For this reason I’m committed to supporting Athens-based artists and having dialogue with aspects of the Athens art community, with the view that the gallery’s mission should be molded over time from this approach. If I’m not mindful of the importance of dialogue and community here in Plateia Amerikis, then I’m in danger of recreating the very issues I claim to oppose.
S52: Looking ahead, Cynefin Athens is programmed through 2026. What are some of the key exhibitions or projects you are excited to see unfold in the coming years?
Neal Rock: I’m excited about all of them but a few to name are the upcoming projects of London-based painter and painting lecturer at the Royal College of Art, Tahmina Negmat. Tahmina will be in residence from January through February, with a solo show opening in March. We have a project by Athens-based artist Antigoni Pasidi. Antigoni returned to Athens a few years ago after having lived in the UK for many years, finishing her PhD in Sculpture there and then teaching at the Arts University Plymouth. She will be in residence from March through April, with a solo show opening in May. In 2026, US-based artist Alexandria Smith will have a solo show and residency in the summer. I’ve known her work for almost ten years, she has had recent solo shows with Gagosian Gallery, and is currently Painting Head for undergraduate printmaking and painting at Yale University in the US. This will be her first time showing in Greece.
S52: How do you manage to balance your role as a professor at the University of Virginia, running the Cynefin space in Athens, and continuing your own artistic practice?

Neal Rock: It’s a pretty hectic schedule and I’m not sure if I balance it much – more like being swept up in cycles or patterns at particular times of the year. One of the benefits of FAR and Cynefin Athens is that I don’t see hard boundaries between ‘my’ art practice and that of running these programs. Linda Goode Bryant, also an artist, once said that she saw JAM as an artwork and to be honest, that’s how I see both FAR and Cynefin Athens – they are forms of cultural production that I’m deeply committed to. I also have the privilege of being in conversation with artists of different generations and backgrounds, which is incredibly enriching for my work, as I thrive on that kind of engagement. Back in the studio, my practice is impacted in how I think about the boundaries and contexts which have given form and meaning to what I do.
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Neal Rock
Neal Rock is a Welsh visual artist who was born and raised in the industrial steel town of Port Talbot, South Wales (UK). A naturalized American & Irish citizen, he currently lives and works in Charlottesville, Virginia and Athens, Greece. He holds a BA (Hons) in Painting from the University of Gloucestershire, UK; an MA in Fine Art from Central Saint Martins School of Art & Design, London and a practice-based Ph.D. in Painting from London’s Royal College of Art. With a visual art practice that encompasses interdisciplinary approaches to painting informed by histories of prosthetics & abstraction, he has exhibited extensively internationally since the early 2000s. His work has been featured in commercial solo exhibitions in London, Amsterdam, Paris, New York and Los Angeles, and Rock has participated in international survey exhibitions at the Albright-Knox Art Gallery, Buffalo, New York; the Wexner Center for the Arts, Columbus, OH; Contemporary Art Museum Houston, TX; The John Moores Painting Prize, Walker Art Gallery, Liverpool, UK; New York’s Storefront for Art & Architecture; London’s Royal Academy of Art & ICA, amongst others. In 2009 he had his first public gallery solo exhibition; Fansestra & Other Works, at the New Art Gallery Walsall, UK. He was the recipient of the 2015-16 Grant Wood Painting Fellowship at the University of Iowa, alongside other residencies and fellowships including, MASS MoCA, Yaddo, VCCA and South Dakota State University. He is the founder / director of FAR and Cynefin Athens and is an Associate Professor of Studio Art; Painting at the University of Virginia.
Exhibition info
Perivoli – Equivocation
https://www.freemanartistresidency.com/cynefin-athens
Rafael Pérez Evans, https://rafaelperezevans.com/
Nov 16th – Dec 21st 2024
Thurs – Sat. 4pm – 8pm or by appointment
Cynefin Athens | Κινέβην Αθήνα
Lefkosias 13. Plateia Amerikis
Athens 11252
Greece
Founder / Director Neal Rock
Email: nealrock@hotmail.com
WhatsApp & US Cell:
+1 323 877 5483