Vakirtzis Giorgos (1923 – 1988)
Biography
He was born in Mytilene in 1923 and died in Athens in 1988.
He began his studies at the Athens School of Fine Arts under Umvertos Argyros and Konstantinos Parthenis (1939–1946), having already gained experience in folk art, sign painting, and cinema billboards. He continued his studies in painting, printmaking, and graphic arts at the École des Beaux-Arts in Paris (1952–1953).
His work was dominated by his involvement with monumental cinema billboards, as well as the fields of advertising, graphic arts, and book illustration. He also published studies and authored books.
He exhibited his work in solo and group exhibitions in Greece and abroad, including New York, Antwerp, Paris, and Moscow. He participated in Panhellenic and international exhibitions in Belgrade and Bucharest (1977), Stuttgart (1978), Paris (1978), and elsewhere. A retrospective exhibition was organized at the National Gallery in 1989.
He was honored with numerous awards. In 1980, he was officially invited to Moscow as a member of the international jury for the Olympic Games posters.