Stelios Votsis
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Stelios Votsis ( el, Στέλιος Βότσης 21 November 1929 – 9 November 2012) was a
Cypriot Cypriot (in older sources often "Cypriote") refers to someone or something of, from, or related to the country of Cyprus. * Cypriot people, or of Cypriot descent; this includes: **Armenian Cypriots **Greek Cypriots **Maronite Cypriots **Turkish C ...
artist, one of the leading figures of modern art on the island, a co-founder of the Cyprus Chamber of Fine Arts and its one-time president. His style was best characterized as ‘structural abstraction’, he worked in painting and drawing.


Early life and education

Born in
Larnaca Larnaca ( el, Λάρνακα ; tr, Larnaka) is a city on the south east coast of Cyprus and the capital of the district of the same name. It is the third-largest city in the country, after Nicosia and Limassol, with a metro population of 144 ...
21 November 1929, he demonstrated an aptitude for painting early on and staged exhibitions while still a high-school student at the Pancypriot Commercial School. Upon graduation, he travelled to post-war England in 1949 to pursue his dream of studying art. His studies took him to Saint Martin's School of Art,
Sir John Cass College London Guildhall University was a university in the United Kingdom from 1992 to 2002, established when the City of London Polytechnic was awarded university status. On 1 August 2002, it merged with the University of North London to form Londo ...
, the Royal Academy of Fine Arts and the
Slade School of Art The UCL Slade School of Fine Art (informally The Slade) is the art school of University College London (UCL) and is based in London, England. It has been ranked as the UK's top art and design educational institution. The school is organised as ...
. As his friend the late
Stass Paraskos Stass Paraskos ( el, Στας Παράσκος; 17 March 1933 – 4 March 2014) was an artist from Cyprus, although much of his life was spent teaching and working in England. Early life Paraskos was born in Anaphotia, a village near the city ...
noted: "At the Slade, he was taught by William Coldstream, and in his early work Votsis was influenced by the Euston Road School, a group of leftwing realist artists including Coldstream". In his second year at the Slade, he won first prize in a university-wide drawing competition but declined the prize, explaining that he did not deem his work deserving. Those same exacting standards led him to destroy almost all the paintings he produced during this period. After enduring financial hardship and even a bout of tuberculosis, he graduated from the Slade in 1955.


Career

He returned to Cyprus the same year and co-founded the Cyprus Chamber of Fine Arts. Together with a number of other pioneering artists he was instrumental in introducing modern art to Cyprus. He represented the island nation on the international stage in various exhibitions including: *''The Venice Biennale'' *''The Biennale of Alexandria'' *''The Triennale of India'' *''The São Paulo Biennial'' *''The Biennial of Graphic Arts in Buenos Aires-Argentina'' *''The International Exhibition of New Artists in New York'' *''The International Biennial of Graphic Arts in Fredrikstad Norway'' *''The International Exhibition of Graphic Arts in Frechen Germany'' *''The International Exhibition of Graphic Arts (Gallery Du Bois) in Pennsylvania'' *''The Brussels Biennale'' His paintings can be found in a number of collections including the
National Gallery of Greece The National Gallery ( el, Εθνική Πινακοθήκη, ''Ethniki Pinakothiki'') is an art museum located on Vasilissis Sofias avenue in the Pangrati district, Athens, Greece. It is devoted to Greek and European art from the 14th century ...
, the Greek Ministry of Culture, the Vorres Museum, the Presidential Palace of Cyprus and other public and private collections in Cyprus, Greece and beyond. Notable among the work completed prior to his death is his collaboration with the artist Stass Paraskos. Working on a single canvas but maintaining their respective styles, these paintings are known as the ‘pomishiarika’ (Cypriot dialect for ‘jointly owned’), although the art historian Michael Paraskos has described them as essentially anarchist paintings in which the 'dictatorship' of the single artist over the canvas is replaced by a democratic space.Michael Paraskos, 'The Anarchists', in Stelios Votsis and Stass Paraskos, ''The Anarchists'' xhibition catalogue(Nicosia: En Tiris, 2007) p.7 Some of these joint works were put on display in Nicosia 2007, in an exhibition inaugurated by the British art historian
Norbert Lynton Norbert Casper Lynton (22 September 1927 – 30 October 2007, Brighton, England ) was Professor of the History of Art at the University of Sussex. From 1998 - 2006 he was Chairman of the Charleston Trust. He has published on architecture ...
. Votsis was awarded the Ruskin prize in drawing and the bronze medal in the European prize for painting contest which was held in Ostend-Belgium in 1973. For his contributions to the culture of Cyprus he was awarded an Annual Honorary Grant by the Ministry of Education and Culture of the Republic of Cyprus.


References

{{DEFAULTSORT:Votsis, Stelios 1929 births 2012 deaths Greek Cypriot artists Cypriot painters