Yannis Tsarouchis

Born in Piraeus in 1910, Yannis Tsarouchis studied at the Athens School of Fine Arts (1928–34) under Konstantinos Parthenis (from 1932 onward). Between 1930 and 1934, he apprenticed with Fotis Kontoglou, who introduced him to the art of Byzantine iconography. In 1934 he traveled to Constantinople and Smyrna, in 1935 to Paris, and in 1936 to Naples and Pompeii. In 1938 he staged his first exhibition in an empty store near Syntagma Square and participated in the First Annual Panhellenic Art Fair at Zappeion Exhibition Hall. In 1940 he was conscripted and served on the Albanian front. In 1951 he held solo exhibitions at the Galerie d’Art du Faubourg in Paris and at the Redfern Gallery in London, and the following year he had a retrospective at the British Council in Athens. In 1958 he represented Greece at the Venice Biennale. He was a founding member of the Armos group. From 1967 to 1980 he lived in France. He worked in weaving, book illustration, and above all stage design. He collaborated with Karolos Koun, Manos Hadjidakis, Michael Cacoyannis, and Maria Callas. In 1977 he directed "The Trojan Women" in a parking lot on Kaplanon Street in central Athens. In 1981 the artist founded the Yannis Tsarouchis Foundation in Maroussi. As one of the most influential Greek painters of the twentieth century, he combined the modern with the traditional, drawing on Henri Matisse, Karaghiozis shadow theatre, Theofilos, Fayum portraits, neoclassical houses, Byzantine art, and the Baroque. He celebrated the nude male body, painting sailors, soldiers, and football players as Eros figures and saints. A prolific writer, he published essays, studies, and translations. He died in Athens in 1989. Accompanying the 2021 major survey at Wrightwood 659 in Chicago, Sternberg Press released the publication "Yannis Tsarouchis: Dancing in Real Life".