IAKOVOS RAGOUSSIS

Interview: Maro Voulgari | Photos: Mary Chatzaki

The “Theophilos” of Antiparos

In a tavern on Antiparos island, Iakovos Ragoussis, a veritable people’s artist, was a mind-blowing revelation for us. With an idiosyncratic identifying writing style and a very mature philosophy of life, he spoke to us about his art and his thoughts on living on the island.

I’ve been painting for six years. It came to me out of nowhere when I was trying to decorate my tavern. I’m self-taught but I don’t want to take any classes. I don’t think they’d do me any good. I believe I’d lose something. Even in holy iconography, which is pure technique, I let my instinct guide me.
This is not a kind of painting that necessarily depicts the island. Internal landscapes emerge. They are journeys through time and journeys into the self. It’s not painting that you look at. It’s painting of the mind.

I paint ships, mythical creatures, flowers and women. They’re magical, divine, mythical, strong women. I developed my painting quite a bit during the quarantine. I went deeper into the details of it. I had plenty of time to dedicate myself to the craft. I want to do nothing but paint.

I paint on canvases, walls, tables, pieces of wood, on the floor. I use oils, acrylics and pastels, but many of my paintings are made with regular plastic walls paints.

I like polychromy. That’s why I made this multicolour tavern. But at first, the people from the Municipality looked at me sideways because I was ruining the white-and-blue harmony – which is artificial as the islands have always been colourful.

In my paintings, there are snakes, fruits, flowers, rams, women looking at you straight in the eye with light-coloured eyes, horses and lots of ships. I can’t explain all of them. They are symbols that have a particular meaning at a particular moment. I neither explain nor sell my paintings. If money comes between us, my relationship with painting will change. I don’t mass produce either – each piece is unique.

Let’s say it’s a personal diary, but one made up of drawings instead of words. Isn’t painting a medium of messages? In paintings there’s also a painted eye. Usually, but not always, to me it’s a symbol of the eye of God.

Snakes and demons, medusas, lamias and ancient deities, Egyptian heads, spirits of nature… That’s my world. A world born here in the triangle of Mesopotamia, where the first civilizations developed.

I paint inside the tavern during the lunch break between one and four p.m. I can’t paint anywhere else and I don’t use an easel. I go directly with a brush without any outlines, and straight from the tube. For me, every surface is a potential canvas. I paint on a table next to the kitchen. Then, I paint again in the evening. For me, it’s companionship, expression, communication – it’s a connection with my inner self…