Panagiotis Doxaras

Infobox_Person
name = Panagiotis Doxaras
"Παναγιώτης Δοξαράς"
birth_date = 1662
birth_place =
death_date = 1729
death_place = , Greece
occupation = painter

Panagiotis Doxaras ( _el. Παναγιώτης Δοξαράς) (Mani, 1662 -Corfu, 1729) was a Greek painter who founded the Heptanese School of Greek art [Κουτσιλιέρη, Ανάργυρου: Ιστορία της Μάνης. Παπαδήμας, Αθήνα 1993] .

Biography

In 1664 his family moved to Zante where he was taught iconography by Leo Moscos. In 1694 he joined the Venetian army and fought against the Ottomans in Chios. In 1696 he left the Venetian army. The Venetians rewarded him with a knighthood and later (1721) by donating him several acres of land in Lefkas. From 1699 to 1704 he studied painting in Venice and from 1704 to 1715 he lived in Kalamata. The rest of his life he lived in the Ionian islands dividing his time between Lefkas, Corfu and Zante [ [http://www.guidesvoyages.be/zakynthos/peinture.htm Zakynthos-Zante- Peinture ] ] .

Work

Doxaras' work signals the departure of Greek painting from the Byzantine iconography towards the Western European Renaissance art. He admired passionately the great Italian painters and in particular Leonardo Da Vinci, whose book "Art of painting" (Trattato della pittura) he translated in Greek [ [http://www.bbk.ac.uk/hosted/leonardo/newsmay2005.htm Leonardo da Vinci Society Newsletter ] ] .

In 1726 he wrote the famous, albeit controversial and much debated theoretical text "On painting" ("Περί ζωγραφίας") in which he addressed the need for Greek art to depart from Byzantine art towards Western European art. The article was originally published after Doxaras' death in 1871. His article even today is the subject of much discussion in Greece [Δοξαράς, Παναγιώτης: Περί ζωγραφίας, εκδ. Σπ. Π. Λάμπρου, εν Αθήναις, 1871; Αθήνα (Εκάτη 1996)] .

Despite Doxaras' religious subjects, he was the first painter that tried to depict realistically the faces of his figures and his paintings' religious scenes. Doxaras also introduced into Greek iconography the technique of oil-painting which replaced the old method of mixing pigments with egg yolk [ [http://www.corfuxenos.gr/History/finearts.htm Culture: Fine Arts ] ] . Having as a quide the works of Paolo Veronese, he painted the roof of Agios Spyridonas in Corfu. Sadly, the images were faded and later in the middle of the 19th century were replaced with newer ones painted by Nikolaos Aspiotis [Λάμπρου, Σπ.: Συμπληρωματικαί ειδήσεις περί του ζωγράφου Παναγιώτου Δοξαρά Ν. *Ελληνομνήμων ή Σύμμικτα Ελληνικά, τ. 1, 1843] .Doxaras was also the first painter that worked on porraiture. His most famous portrait was that of Count Graf von der Schulenburg, leader of the Venetian army and defendant of Corfu. Nikolaos Doxaras (1700/1706-1775), son of Panagiotis Doxaras continued the artistic legacy of his father.

ee also

* Heptanese School
* Byzantine Art

References