He studied law and while he was slated to enter the Judicature, at the same time he studied painting at the Julian Academy where he became acquainted with the Nabis group. In 1888 he was accepted at the Ecole des Beaux Arts. There he met Vuillard and they became friends. The following year he sold a lithographed poster which garnered the admiration of Toulouse-Lautrec, who followed his example. He exhibited at the Salon des Independants and with his company of friends at the Nabis. In 1896 he had his first solo exhibition at the Durand-Ruel Galllery. He had regular exhibits at this same gallery from 1904 to 1933.
Starting at an early age he had retrospectives in his honor held in various cities throughout the world. He also worked as a book and magazine illustrator. For a brief period he became involved with sculpture.
Until the end of 1909, Bonnard was deeply influenced by Japanese painting. He adopted the Japanese manner of framing prints and their placard paints. During that same period he designed various objects, costumes and stage sets for the Theatre de l’ Oeuvre.
He travelled a great deal in France and also visited Spain, Belgium, the Netherlands, England, Tunisia, Algeria and Italy. The impressions gained from these trips modified his painting and enlivened his colors. Gradually color became the primary element in his works. His subjects were taken from his everyday life and consisted by and large of nudes, still lifes and images from his home’s interior. In 1926 he lived for a time in Pittsburgh as a member of the committee for the Carnegie Prize which he himself won twice, n 1923 and 1930.
From 1930 on he used gouache to produce the intensity of color he desired.
In 1939 he settled in the village of Cannet on the Cote d’Azur and his painting became completely dominated by color. The transformation of light into color and the expression of the joy of everyday life are to be found in all his works.
Matisse admired his work and was his friend for nearly forty years. One of the most important colorists, he influenced Rothko and led him to abstraction and his work was always a point of reference for all subsequent French painters.
He began his study of art in La Harve in the Municipal Art School from which he graduated. There he met Othon Friesz and Raoul Dufy and he kept up his friendship with them when he settled in Paris in 1902. He got to know the work of Van Gogh and took lessons at the Academie Humbert, where Francis Picabia and Marie Laurencin were among his fellow students. For a brief time in 1903 he attended the Leon Bonnat Studio at the Ecole de Beaux Arts from which Friesz and Dufy had already graduated. The strictly academic teachings of Bonnat did not suit the nature of his inquiries and he soon left his studies there.
He came into contact with avant garde art of the time in 1905, when he visited the Salon d’ Automne and saw the works of Derain and Matisse. He also got to know the members of the “Cercle de l’ Art Moderne”. He exhibited for the first time in 1906 at the Salon des Independants and this was followed by works influenced by the Fauvists. Apollinaire introduced him to Picasso. He also got to know the gallery owner Daniel-Henry Kahnweiller. He travelled to Estaque and gradually abandoned Fauvist color while at the same time coming under the influence of Cezanne’s work. In 1907 he saw “Les Demoiselles d’ Avignon” in Picasso’s workshop and impressed by it, painted his own “Large Nude”. The organization of the volumes and the use of color reveal its relationship to Picasso’s work. He painted his first cubist works in 1908, after another trip to Estaque, and then exhibited them in Kahnweiller’s gallery.
These would be followed by the still lifes concerned with musical instruments which launched the period of analytical cubism. Until 1912, he did experiments with the use of letters of the alphabet in his work and mixing sand in his pigments. During this period he met with Picasso daily. Both of the artists began to use various non-painting materials in their works arriving at works combining collage and painting. Their experiments would continue until 1914 when Braque was called up to serve in the French Army. He received a serious head injury that left him blind for a long period. He became involved with painting again after 1916 and until 1918 would continue to work in the spirit of analytical Cubism. During the following years the dimensions of his works would grow and for the first time he became interested in engraving.
In the middle of that decade he would adopt a neoclassical style in reply to the chaos the war had created. He would also become involved with stage and costume design, working with the Ballet Russes. In 19129 he built a country house in the village Varengeville-sur-Mer in Normandy. He spent his summers there and produced small landscapes. The motif of repeated curved outlines would lead him to the study of ancient Greek vases at the Louvre. In 1932 he illustrated Hesiod’s “Theogony”, commissioned by Ambroise Vollard. His color gamut gradually changed. He began a series of works whose subject was his studio and “Vanitas”.
During the Occupation the painter spent a period of inactivity and then painted the interiors of houses, or did still lifes in dark colors. After the Liberation, he returned to Varengeville and a while later became involved with color lithography. By 1956 he had completed nine series of works with his studio as the subject. In 1953 he was invited to decorate the ceiling of the Etruscan room at the Louvre. His final works were landscapes of small dimensions done in sharp relief with a tendency toward abstraction.
Creator, together with Picasso, of Cubism, he influenced all later European art through his experiments.
A student of Nikolaos Kantounis in Zakynthos, he afterward studied in Italy, more specifically St. Luke’s Academy in Rome and the Royal Academy of Florence. After living in Florence for twelve years, he returned to his own homeland and became involved with painting icons for churches while at the same time teaching both in Lefkada and the Ionian Academy of Corfu (1858-1864). In 1867 he took part in the World Exhibition of Paris with two portraits. He was awarded a bronze medal at the Olympia Exhibition of 1870 while at the one of 1875 he exhibited copies of works of the Renaissance and Baroque and received a silver medal.
A representative of Ionian island art, he painted both original works and copies, being mainly involved with religious scenes and portraiture. By and large, he stuck to academic models from the 18th century while in his portraits, which correspond to the expectations of his bourgeois clientele, he placed the emphasis on the nobility of character of those being depicted.
She studied at the Ecole Cantonale de Dessin et d’Art Applique in Laussanne (1952-1954), the Athens School of Fine Arts (1954-1958), under Yannis Moralis and Yannis Kefallinos, and the London Central School of Arts and Design (1958-1961). She taught at the Vacalo School (1963-1967), the Technology Applications Centre (1970-1971), and the Athens School of Fine Arts (1984-1986) as a scientific advisor. In 1962, her first solo exhibition was organised in Rome; her work went on to be exhibited in solo and group shows of painting and tapestry in Greece and other countries, including the Alexandria Biennale in 1980 and the 1982 Europalia in Brussels. Her articles and essays have also been published in the daily and periodical press and exhibition catalogues.
From her early work, she has adopted an expressionistic style of abundant colour. She went on to use tapestry, engraving, and traditional techniques in spatial constructions and other works in which she voices her social critique, ranging in subject from the destruction of nature to the position of women and their traditional role.
He studied at the Athens School of Fine Arts (1954-1960), under Yannis Moralis and Spyros Papaloukas. In 1960, on scholarship from the Mika Skouze Estate, he went for the first time to Paris, where he continued his studies at the School of Fine Arts with Maurice Brianchon, from 1963 until 1966, on subsidy by the Greek State Grant Foundation. In 1960, his first solo exhibition was organised at the Municipal Library of Rethymnon; his work was shown in solo and group exhibitions in Greece and abroad. In 1983, a retrospective exhibition of his work was organised at the Saint Mark Basilica in Heraklion and in 1986, one year after his death, at the National Gallery. In 1968, he was appointed assistant at the School of Fine Arts preparatory class, where he taught until 1978; he wrote the study “The Medium of Oil,” published in 1981 by the Athens School of Fine Arts for the use of students.
In his painting, he first focused on still lifes and interiors, emanating from his personal experiences, approaching his compositions in a naturalist vein and emphasizing specific objects. Later, he was to develop his own critique of the political situation through the introduction of objects of a symbolic character (flags, medals of honour, trumpets), while in the latest phase of his work he focused on female nudes and portraits.
He studied painting at the Athens School of Fine Arts (1959-1963), at the Yannis Moralis studio, and wall painting. He became involved with set design while still a student. In 1965- 1966, on a scholarship from the State Scholarship Service, he travelled and systematically studied ancient, Byzantine and folk art. In 1966 he taught freehand drawing at the Center for Technological Applications. On a scholarship from the French government, he studied at the Paris School of Fine Arts (1967-1968). He settled permanently in Paris and continued his studies at the Ecole Pratique des Hautes atudes and the Louvre School until 1974.
He has presented his work at many art galleries and museums in Greece and abroad and retrospective exhibitions of his work have been organized by the Municipal Gallery of Rhodes (1984), the Vafopouleio Cultural Center of Thessaloniki (1990) and the Municipal Gallery of Patras (1994). In 1979 he took part in the Sao Paolo Biennale while in 1984 he received the Drouant-Cartier prize for his entire oeuvre.
Landscapes, interiors, still lifes, and compositions with objects make up the subject matter of his work, which is linked to metaphysical painting and is influenced by Giorgio de Chirico and Giorgio Morandi
Having moved to Athens with his family in 1938, in 1951 he went to Paris, where he studied painting with Andre Lhote as well as poster and drawing with Paul Colin. In 1955, he returned to Greece and began to work as a freelance graphic artist. In 1959, he began to design and make pavilions for Greek and international exhibitions, while in 1974 he established the agency A & M Katzourakis Interior and Graphic Design, specialising on luxury cruise boats. During 1960-1967, he worked as artistic advisor for the Hellenic Tourism Organisation, while from 1962 until 1974 he directed, along with F. Karabot, the Athens Advertising Centre K&K. In 1955 was organised his first solo exhibition, and he went on to present his work in solo and group exhibitions of painting, sculpture and graphic arts in Greece and other countries, receiving numerous distinctions.
The starting point for his work, both painting and sculpture, is geometric abstraction; his compositions are distinguished for their strong organisation. Since 1970, he has turned his attention almost exclusively to works of a monumental scale, incorporated into exterior or interior walls in public buildings, banks, hotels, and factories. In his most recent works he has been using natural as well as industrial materials.
“He studied at the Athens School of Fine Arts under professors Konstantinos Parthenis, Dimitrios Biskinis, Thomas Thomopoulos and Yannis Kefallinos. After his graduation in 1938, he worked with the painter Evangelos Ioannidis; thanks to his apprenticeship under Fotis Kontoglou and professor Alexandros Xyngopoulos, he was exposed to the tradition and the spirit of the Byzantine and post-Byzantine art. Along with Yannis Tsarouchis, he worked as assistant for the monumental mural that Kontoglou made in his house, today in the National Gallery. He travelled in many European countries and made independent art studies in Munich and cities in Italy. On his return to Greece, he worked as teacher for many years, while in 1967 was appointed professor of painting at the School of Architecture, National Technical University of Athens, where he had worked as lecturer since the late 1930s.
As early as the pre-war years, he had shown his works of painting at a solo exhibition, organised at the house of N. Kalamaris (1939), causing extreme reactions by the critics. A series of solo and group exhibitions followed in Greece and other countries. One year earlier, in 1938, his first poetry collection, entitled “”Μην ομιλείτε εις τον οδηγόν”” was published by Kyklos Publications, while in 1939 “”Κλειδοκύμβαλα της σιωπής”” came out. In 1954, he exclusively represented Greece at the Biennale of Venice with one hundred of his works, and one year later, he participated in the Biennale of Sao Paulo. He also participated in all the exhibitions of the group “Armos,” of which he was founding member (1964). In 1958, he received the First Poetry Award of the Hellenic Ministry of Education, and in 1966 received the Golden Cross of George I for his oeuvre of painting. Retrospective exhibitions of his work were organised at the Moraitis Educational Society in 1977 and the National Gallery in 1983. He also produced set designs for the theatre and illustrations for books.
The introducer and principal exponent of Surrealism in Greece, member of the so-called Generation of the Thirties, he combined elements and iconography from a great span of the Greek tradition, from mythology and antiquity to Byzantium, modern times and the contemporary period, in an unconventional fashion, in an often bitterly ironic or humorous vein. Evident in his paintings is an erotic mood, incarnated in the male and female nude figures that inhabit them. He stressed the formative influence exerted on his work by the art of his teachers, Parthenis and Kontoglou, as well as by his acquaintance with the poet Andreas Empeirikos and the pre-eminent representative of metaphysical painting, Giorgio de Chirico. Thanks to his painting and poetry, Engonopoulos, a man of a wide-ranging culture, is among the great intellectual figures of post-War Greece. “
At the Athens School of Fine Arts he studied painting (1956-1961) under Yannis Moralis and stage design, advertising and the decorative arts (1962-1964) under Vasilis Vasileiadis. In 1964-1965 he received a scholarship from the State Scholarship Service to study Byzantine art and the folk art of Greece. From 1964 to 1986 he taught as a professor of professional education in public and private schools. He has presented his work in many solo, group (Panhellenies 1965, 1967, 1969, 1975) and international exhibitions (Sao Paolo Biennale 1969, International Festival of Painting, Cagnes-sur-Mer 1971) in Greece and abroad, while, in addition to his painting, he has been involved with the illustration of publications as well as set design, working both for the theater and the cinema.
Already by the Seventies he was involved with the painted rendering of the natural space, but without limiting himself to the formal conditions imposed by landscape painting, later creating, through the development of elements taken from a variety of stylistic trends, a series of works called Eternal Landscape.
