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signed u.l.

oil on panel

The present work will be included in the forthcoming Nikiforos Lytras monograph being prepared by Dr. Nelly Missirli.

We are grateful to Nelly Missirli for her assistance in the cataloguing of this work.
PROVENANCE

Private Collection, Athens
CATALOGUE NOTE

In the period between 1870 and 1880, Lytras travelled to the East and his works show a clear inspiration of the oriental world he encountered. Lytras borrowed from the East a variety of local themes, types, peoples and costumes, which he transposed into images with a strong folkloric character. In 1873 he travelled to Asia Minor with his friend, Nicholaos Gysis. Of this trip Xenofon Sochos wrote in 1929: "Nikiforos Lytras and Nicolaos Gysis, two great painters and inseparable friends, decided to embark on an artistic journey to Asia Minor, to observe and study the local inhabitants. To commemorate this journey, they purchased a Zeybek's and a Hodja's garb, which they wore and were photographed in, the one seated as a Zeybek is Gysis, while the one standing as a Hodja is Lytras. Thus both artists observed the Zeybeks in detail and rendered them in wonderful pictures." (see fig. 1).

According to Nelly Missirli, it is probable that the present work is a previously unknown study for the finished oil, now in the collection of the National Gallery and Alexandros Soutzos Museum (fig. 2).

Fig.1: a photo of Lytras and Gysis as Zeybek and Hodja @ National Gallery and Alexandros Soutzos Museum, Athens

Fig. 2: Nikiforos Lytras, The Zeybek, after 1873 @ National Gallery and Alexandros Soutzos Museum, Collection of E. Koutlidis, Athens

See also notes to lots 6 and 9.