Ferekidis Nikolaos

Nikolaos Ferekidis (Naples 1862 – Athens 1929) studied at the School of Fine Arts (1888- 1892), with teacher Nikiphoros Lytras. In 1893, he moved to Munich, where he continued and completed his studies at the Academy of Munich, alongside N. Gyzis. In Munich, he organized his first solo exhibition, and in 1901, the governor of the National Bank, S. Streit, commissioned him to copy the painting by Peter von Hess titled “The Arrival of Otto in Nafplio.” This prompted him to engage in copying other paintings by Hess, which depicted Greek themes and were displayed in the colonnade of the Royal Garden in Munich.

In 1909, he returned to Greece, and during the Balkan Wars of 1912-1913, he painted battles and landscapes of Macedonia, establishing himself as a “war painter.” Between 1919 and 1922, he lived in Thessaloniki, where he copied 16 mosaics and frescoes from the metropolitan church of the city, which are now housed in the Byzantine Museum of Athens. He also painted landscapes, genre scenes, and portraits. His style ranged between expressive realism for war scenes, impressionism for genre images and landscapes, and academicism for portraits. In his work “George Spetseropoulos,” which belongs to the collection of the Municipality of Tripolis, the artist depicts the figure of the benefactor of the Greek Community of Cairo and of the Municipality of Tripolis in middle age.

Dictionary of Greek Artists (16th – 20th century),
Melissa Editions, Athens 1997-2000