The key feature in Parthenis’ work is light. “Light equals colour. It is what gives birth to shape” he was claiming in his own characteristic way. In the work belonging to the collection of our Foundation entitled Harmony (1930), the maturity of his writing is evident. The colour and the tonal scale are limited, while abstract morphological elements appear dematerialized in the composition.
Constantinos Parthenis was born in Alexandria, Egypt in 1878, at a time of financial prosperity for his family, which provided him with an intercultural education. At the age of 19 he travelled to Vienna with his German teacher, Karl Wilhelm Diefenbach. In Vienna, he studied at the School of Fine Arts and was influenced by the symbolists and intellectuals of that era. Equally important is the influence he received from music, which was reflected on the intense lyricism of his works. As it already evident from the early works of the Viennese period, the painter had developed a very personal painting language too early. Subsequently, he travelled to Rome - his mother’s birthplace - and Paris, where he was influenced by the viewpoint of the movement of modernism, the moral lessons taught by Cézanne and the fauvists, in their mildest expression. Also, it is worth noting the painter’s love and dedication to ecclesiastical painting, with which he dealt at a very early stage, while he drew a significant inspiration on the cultural tradition of Byzantium and the ancient Greece.
For the 20th century Greece, Parthenis’ contribution was extremely important, as he influenced many modern Greek artists. After all, he was the one who introduced the European dimension to Greek art through his work. However, despite his significant gift, he was named a professor at the Athens School of Fine Arts with difficulty, as many art critics were dispraising his work, which turn against the academicism of the Munich School.
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