1962, Nikos Katzikyriakos-Ghika, Initiatory Landscape -- National Gallery (Athens)
From the museum label: Nikos Hadjikyriakos-Ghika went to Paris at a very early age, at the beginning of the Twenties. European modernism had already completed its consecutive revolutions through a series of movements that developed in various directions. This was a period of syncretism and acceptance. The Post-WWI optimism, the intellectual tolerance, the exuberant artistic ambience of Paris, defined the climate which had a formative influence on young Ghika. His master Konstantinos Parthenis had prepared him through his "linear, geometric and methodical teaching" to comprehend Cubism and Geometric Abstraction without much effort. Furthermore, this contemplative and educated painter would soon discover the same principles in Byzantine art as well. "In Paris, which was the foremost artistic center of the time", he said, "I was spontaneously drawn to the most austere form of art, Cubism, or rather its second period, Synthetic Cubism". While Analytical Cubism sought the reduction of the visible to conceptual shapes, Synthetic Cubism returned to their sources, to the senses, to a new acquaintance with the things themselves, which finally led to Collage. Hadjikyriakos-Ghika was initiated on his own behalf in both these variants, but from nature, and through Greek light and color.
1962, Nikos Katzikyriakos-Ghika, Initiatory Landscape -- National Gallery (Athens)
From the museum label: Nikos Hadjikyriakos-Ghika went to Paris at a very early age, at the beginning of the Twenties. European modernism had already completed its consecutive revolutions through a series of movements that developed in various directions. This was a period of syncretism and acceptance. The Post-WWI optimism, the intellectual tolerance, the exuberant artistic ambience of Paris, defined the climate which had a formative influence on young Ghika. His master Konstantinos Parthenis had prepared him through his "linear, geometric and methodical teaching" to comprehend Cubism and Geometric Abstraction without much effort. Furthermore, this contemplative and educated painter would soon discover the same principles in Byzantine art as well. "In Paris, which was the foremost artistic center of the time", he said, "I was spontaneously drawn to the most austere form of art, Cubism, or rather its second period, Synthetic Cubism". While Analytical Cubism sought the reduction of the visible to conceptual shapes, Synthetic Cubism returned to their sources, to the senses, to a new acquaintance with the things themselves, which finally led to Collage. Hadjikyriakos-Ghika was initiated on his own behalf in both these variants, but from nature, and through Greek light and color.