Background
Alekos Kontopoulos was born in 1904 in Lamía, Fthiotis, Greece.
Alekos Kontopoulos was born in 1904 in Lamía, Fthiotis, Greece.
From a young age, Alekos became a student of religious icon painter Y. Sarafianos, and even presented a solo exhibition at a café in Lamia in 1923. He studied at the Athens School of Fine Arts with Iakovidis, Geraniotis, Mathiopoulos and Lytras during 1923 - 1929. He continued his studies in Paris, with P. Le Doux and H. Morisset in 1930 - 1932. In 1935, he returned to Paris, where he attended painting classes at the Ecole des Beaux Arts and at the Colarossi and Grande Chaumière independent art academies, up until 1939.
Alekos presented his first official solo exhibition in Hermes gallery in 1932, he was associated with the leftist circles of the organization Young Pioneers and co-founded the art group Free Artists in 1934. In 1939 Alekos settled permanently in Athens.
During the Occupation, he joined the Greek Resistance and in 1944, he participated in initiatives for the establishment of the Greek Chamber of Fine Arts. Around this time his attitude towards modern art was skeptical, negative almost, and his painting maintained a realistic orientation, leaning towards social criticism. In 1941, he was appointed museum artist at the National Archaeological Museum, where he worked until 1969.
Circa 1947 he attempted a change of direction towards abstract painting, which he strongly defended in the following years, with his work and his writings. In 1949, he became head of the art group Oi Akraioi, which contributed to the spread of abstract forms in Greece. Though his relation to abstract painting was never exclusive or permanent, it was associated with his historic role, as an artist and intellectual, in the modernization of Greek art.
He published the texts of his lectures and essays on art: “Today's painting” in 1951, “Eulogy of Silence” in 1970, “Memento: creating Art - Aesthetic essays” in 1971 and Intellectual “Responsibility” in 1973. His work was presented in solo and group exhibitions in Greece and abroad. He participated in the Biennales of Sao Paulo, Alexandria and Venice in 1960. In 1973, he declined the 1st National Award, protesting against the dictatorship.
One year after his death in Athens in 1975, a retrospective exhibition of his work was organized at the Athens National Art Gallery in 1976, with more to follow in Greece and abroad. His house was donated to the Municipality of Agia Paraskevi by his wife and, since 1999, it operates as the Alekos Kondopoulos Municipal Library and Museum, while in the Lamia Municipal Gallery Alekos Kondopoulos, there is a permanent exhibition of his representative works.
