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Lot 37AR
Spyros Papaloukas(Greek, 1892-1957)'Anastasis' in Aegina 20 x 24 cm.
26 November 2013, 14:00 GMT
London, New Bond Street£10,000 - £15,000
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Spyros Papaloukas (Greek, 1892-1957)
'Anastasis' in Aegina
signed with initials (lower right)
oil on card
20 x 24 cm.
signed with initials (lower right)
oil on card
20 x 24 cm.
Footnotes
Painted in 1923.
PROVENANCE:
Acquired from the artist's daughter Mina Papalouka on 18 May 1976.
Private collection, Athens.
A characteristic scene drawn from the Greek Orthodox tradition taking place in a village square or church courtyard under the blue and white colours of the Greek flag, offered Papaloukas the opportunity to explore pictorial issues and demonstrate a creative fusion of a rich age-old culture with the doctrines of modern art. As if he were making a Byzantine mosaic, he emphasised the flatness of the surface, while liberating colour from its obligation to faithfully describe the world of appearances. This perception, which was of pivotal importance to the art of the Nabis, the fauves and the early 20th c. cubist experiments, is reminiscent of the famous saying by Maurice Denis that a painting is first and foremost a flat surface with colours arranged in a certain order. Moreover, the feeling that the subject has escaped the boundaries of the support, presenting the image as a fragment of broader reality, tends towards the creation of a nearly abstract field of shapes. Especially the alternation of light and dark garments among the faithful on the foreground articulates the composition, investing the surface with a sense of rhythm and helping the viewer's eye explore the pictorial space right up to the edges of the painting.