Emi Avora (b. 1979) was born in Athens and studied at the Royal Academy Schools, London. She mixes hard lines with amorphous shapes in her paintings, digital prints, and drawings to construct imagery that is both architectural and whimsical. She imagines elaborate interiors of public spaces designed for cultural congregation, such as theater lobbies, opera houses, balconies, and ballrooms. “I am fascinated by how aesthetics and historical events that often contribute to current affairs are so intertwined . . . I endeavor to compose and create spaces that suggest a parallel world and offer a space for dreaming,” she explains. Avora looks to the past to re-create scenes of wealth and opulence that take on a sense of decay and abstraction, thereby signaling ideas of transience, change, and progress.