Tellos Agras is born

Tellos Agras (1899-1944) was a soft-spoken lesser poet, but a significant critic of the Thirties, a supporter of the artistic concept of “the form is the artist’s applied moral.” As a poet, he systematically praised the lower classes, the Athenian neighborhoods, the small streets. As a critic, he approached the writings with respect and spirituality and treated them with attention and a slight irony. He organized the field of criticism in Greece and left, as a valuable legacy, his critiques on Kavafis and Karyotakis.

1900 - Georgios Iakovidis assumes the position of director at the National Gallery
At the beginning of the 20th century, a large number of Greek people believed that Georgios Iakovidis (1853-1932), together with the painters Lytras and Gyzis, formed an “artistic triumvirate.” Iakovidis had triumphantly returned to Athens in May of 1900, carrying with him the Gold Medal from the International Exhibition of Paris (1900) for his painting “Children’s Concert.”

He was already famous in Munich, but his wife’s death made him seek a change. He returned to Greece to assume the position of director of the National Pinakothek, the establishment of which was a persistent request of the artistic community.

In 1904 Lytras died, and Iakovidis assumed his position at the School of Fine Arts, and in 1910 he was elected president of the newly founded Association of Greek Artists. So, in a decade, Iakovidis headed three major art institutions: The National Pinakothek, the School of Fine Arts, and the artists’ trade union, confirming his dominance in the artistic circles of Athens and the academic community.