Georgios Jakobides – Painter
Georgios Jakobides (Γεώργιος Ιακωβίδης, Lesbos 11 January 1853 – Athens 13 December 1932) was a Greek painter and one of the main representatives of the Greek artistic movement of the Munich School. He founded and was the first curator of the National Gallery of Greece inAthens.
His first education was in Smyrna, Ottoman Empire. From 1870 to 1876 Jakobides studied sculpture and painting at the Athens School of Fine Arts, and in 1877 he went to the Academy of Fine Arts in Munich on a scholarship to continue his painting studies under Karl Theodor von Piloty.
In Munich he lived for 17 years where he worked in his studio, painting mythological scenes, genre pictures, and portraits. His work is influenced by German academic Realism, his most famous paintings were of children. In the capital of Bavaria he was regarded as a successful German artist selling many of his works at high prices. The Greek government invited him in 1900 to return to Athens to organize the National Gallery of Athens, and in 1904 he was appointed Director of the Athens School of Fine Arts where he taught for 25 years. At this time, additional to his themes he produced formal portraits of eminent Greeks (e.g.Queen Sophia). He opposed all new artistic tendencies, including Impressionism and Expressionism, but supported younger artists to follow their own individual artistic tendencies.
He was given awards at five international exhibits: among those in Berlin 1891 and in Paris 1900.
His works are found in the National Gallery of Athens, private collections and in museums and art galleries around the world including art galleries in Germany and the Art Institute of Chicago.
Worth visiting
The Georgios Iakovidis Digital Museum, located at the painter’s birthplace, the village of Chidira on the island of Lesbos, is the first fully digital museum of art in Greece. More information on how to get there can be found in the official website of the museum.
Source: http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Georgios_Jakobides
