Fikos
Fikos was born in 1987 in Athens, the city he still calls home. From an early age, he would paint whatever he’d see – comics, iconography, landscapes and more.
At the age of 13, he started studying Byzantine painting under the guidance of George Kordis, with whom he would collaborate with for 5 years, painting murals in Orthodox churches, while simultaneously developing his own personal painting style.
Fikos paints his portable images with egg tempera onto hand-made Japanese paper, which are then glued onto wood, and his murals are painted with acrylics.
After having done graffiti and iconography in Christian Orthodox churches, Fikos continued along his evolutionary path as an artist, painting murals in public spaces. The value of these works is exceptional as this is the first time that monumental Byzantine techniques have encountered a contemporary movement like street art.
The themes of his murals emanate from Orthodox Christian tradition and ancient Greek mythology, respectively, while also being directly connected to the places in which they are presented.
Fikos’ paintings are not only a mere “self expression” of an artist but equally embody a social event, a true “creation” ('demiurgia' = demos 'citizens' + ergon 'work') a work for a society of citizens.
Outside of Greece, Fikos’ work has been exhibited, televised, broadcasted on radio and presented in private and public spaces in France, Bulgaria, England, Ireland, Ukraine, Austria, Lithuania, Switzerland, Norway and Mexico.
Fikos aims to garner international recognition and to share the beauty of contemporary Greek paintings with a wider audience, not as a nostalgic accomplishment of the past but as a contemporary universal event.