The first known matrix of woodcut in Europe was found in Macon, France and dates back to 1370 (the side with the angel probably back to approximately 1450). This is a piece of walnut wood cut in both sides by an anonymous printmaker. Part of a bigger plate, it represents on the one side the centurion Longinus next to the cross and an angel on the other side, probably the Angel of Annunciation.

Since the 15th century, printmaking has been offering all over Europe cheap printed pictures, black and white woodcuts first, monochrome or coloured, as well as intaglio prints since the 18th century, before the triumph of co-loured lithography in the second half of the 19th century. Pictures of saints and religious scenes, accompanied by prayers for pilgrims and the poor, pictures with moral and historical content as a propaganda tool of the political regime, with local mythical heroes and folk literature, satires of society, instructive and fun pictures with aspects of distant lands, images of the everyday life of the ordinary people.

Printmaking in Greece and Cyprus is closely related, although Greek printmaking is older that the Cypriot one. The anonymous lithograph representing Archbishop Kyprianos testifies this: the portrait of a martyr of the history of orthodox Cyprus is integrated in a framework that accompanies portraits of other personalities of the «Greek Pantheon». A Cypriot association ordered it and it was printed in Corfu by the lithographic printing house “Aspiotis”.

Printmaking is not known in Greece under Ottoman rule, although in the 18th century, as in whole Europe, icons on paper are released as devotional objects, and there are a few prints with secular subjects in the Ionian Islands, under the cultural influence of Italy. In the 19th century, printmakers-craftsmen create wood engravings to reproduce drawings of foreign artists for the illustration of books and magazines. Artistic printmaking appears in the late 19th century when Greek painters begin to study in Western Europe, often in Paris where they learn printmaking. The first woodcuts are printed and the first intaglio prints appear after 1900. After 1930, Yiannis Kefallinos becomes the first Professor of Printmaking at the Athens School of Fine Arts and opens a workshop where the first generation of printmakers of the Greek school is educated, with printmakers from Greece and Cyprus such as Α. Tassos, Vaso Katraki, Telemachos Kanthos, whose works belong to our collection.

In general, the experience from Metaxas’ dictatorship, the civil war and junta is echoing in the works of many printmakers whose ideals are being violated. Woodcuts and wood engravings, lino-cuts, lithographs created by printmakers who often acquired a wide experience in printmaking in Greece and abroad, testify the variety of both the techniques and the personal language of Greek printmakers.

Established painters and sculptors are also shifting towards printmaking, completing their experiments by the use of different intaglio techniques – often combined in their works. The generations of younger printmakers continue the rich tradition, following the trends of European printmaking, creating works with a free inspiration and using various and mixed techniques.

Printmaking is almost unknown in Cyprus during the whole period of foreign domination, i.e. since the 12th century. While foreign prints, first religious and cartographic (from the 15th to the 17th century), and subsequently with archaeological, folkloric and historical content (from the 17th to the 19th century) are created for Cyprus, and carved wooden matrices are printed traditionally on bread (“typarka”) and fabric, for stamped scarfs, there are no printmakers in the artistic sense of the word.

In World War II, Telemachos Kanthos, following his studies in Athens where he studies printmaking at G. Kefallinos’ workshop, starts creating prints, mainly woodcuts, printing by hand. Both self-learning and educated artists from the same generation of Kanthos but also from the next generation are experimenting with various printmaking techniques, mainly woodcutting and linocutting. In the 70s, Stelios Votsis and Stass Paraskos, important painters and “revolutionary” artists in Cyprus, who have both studied in London, are marginally engaged in screen printing that enables them to use their painting language in printmaking. Since, other artists, with knowledge acquired through their artistic experience abroad, create – among other art works – prints using various techniques.

Young self-taught painter and printmaker, Hambis, meets with A. Tassos who gives him his first printmaking lessons. After his studies in Moscow, he dedicates all of his life in printmaking, creating woodcuts, lithographs, etchings but mainly linocuts and screen prints. Modern Cypriot artists – painters, sculptors etc., as well as exclusively printmakers – adopt all techniques and methods of printmaking in their printed graphic work. In particular, the young ones are experimenting, combining techniques, creating 3D prints and prints-objects. Of course, the collection of Hambis Printmaking Museum has also works of Turkish Cypriot printmakers who, as modern artists, follow the same trends.

Over the centuries, printmaking in Russia is developed in parallel with the European one, under a great influence of political regimes and with specific characteristics. Since the 16th century, religious books are decorated with woodcuts, while Lubok has the same development with the popular printmaking of the rest of Europe, using subjects from religion, society and folk- literature. In the 19th century, it follows the development of techniques, from woodcutting to lithography. Intaglio printmaking appears in the era of Peter the Great, who at the beginning of the 18th century invites western artists to Saint Petersburg. Intaglio printmaking serves his objectives, especially with battle scenes, and especially portraits. With the Tsars who have succeeded him, the court scenes, portraits, views of palaces and magnificent buildings are multiplying. Enlightenment contributes to the printing of illustrated books, at least in the field ofscience. In the 19th century engraving declines, other than the illustration of books usingsteel engraving. On the other hand, lithography is adopted for landscapes, portraits andreproductions of Russian artists’ paintings. Editorial cartoons and scientific representations of antiquities are also part of the theme.

Just like in Western Europe, at the end of the 19th century etching comes back to life with printmakers-creators who combine it with other intaglio methods. During the period of the Soviet Union, printmaking has its own place. Other than the monumental works of Soviet realism (sculptures and paintings), lithography is an effective mean to spread the ideology. However, the “small dimension” printmaking, known in Europe thanks to many exhibitions, follows its own path: on the one hand, cheap materials – wood and linoleum – dominate in printmaking, which acquires an excellent quality. Linocutting and woodcutting are often combined to create works with excellent tonal range. On the other hand, printmakers who have studied before or after the revolution freely create: some of them create scenes and landscapes glorifying the regime, others continue the tradition of genre painting (depicting aspects of everyday life) and above all they glorify the beauty of landscapes, both in nature and the buildings and their cities.

Wood engraving which is preferred for the illustration of literary books reaches a higher grade of expressiveness and skill. Modern printmakers, who have studied in Soviet Union or in the Russian Federation, share the same concerns and experimentations as any other printmaker in the rest of the world.

Printmaking in Latin America seems to be closely connected to its very turbulent history. Until the 19th century, printmaking is a poor art exclusively imported from Europe, although during the end of the colonial rule lithography is spreading. The liberation struggle, the battles for democracy and the first militant movements for equality between indigenous people and settlers influence printmaking which, with poor means, is often militating for fairer regime. In the 20th century, along with works influenced by the aesthetic movements of the United States, an important, purely local, realistic current of militant artists who are also expressing themselves through printmaking, serves the political ideals for which they are fighting.

The important Mexican school, after Jose Posada, remains a popular school in the first half of the 20th century, with leading artists such as Leopoldo Mendez, with woodcuts, linocuts and lithographs, and Adolfo Mexiac, with woodcuts and linocuts. These two militant artists serve the people with realism. Contemporary printmaking is characterised by the double traditional popular trend towards expressionism and surrealism while the themes are taken from the local turbulent history, the oppression of indigenous people and the repeated struggle for freedom, democracy and human rights. A printmaking that expresses its concerns and is experimenting with its subjects and techniques, using irony, symbols and imagination.

In the United States, printmaking has an impressive development. Mainly commercial – illustration of magazines, reproduction of paintings glorifying the history of the new State – in the 19th century, with wood engravings, intaglio prints and lithographs, it acquires towards the end of the century an artistic identity with landscapes, lithographed or etched with an impressionistic trend. As from the 20th century, and in particular after World War II, the USA becomes a melting pot of authentic creativity, with countless printmakers experimenting first in lithography and intaglio printing and then in screen printing – with the artists of Pop Art – and in digital art.

The “Artist’s Book” concept, an expression that appeared at the end of the 19th century in England, changes over time and from country to country (mainly England, France and after 1960 the USA). If we limit ourselves to the artist’s book with prints, we can reach to a definition that contains various criteria. The first four are necessary; the others contribute to the quality of the work. Prints must be authentic, printed from the plate. The consequence of this criterion is the next one, a limited number of printings (sole copy or even less than five hundred copies, often numbered, signed by the printmaker). Moreover, the work has to be a book, i.e. pages that form a unit, with or without text. If there is a text, the dialogue between the author and the artist is necessary (virtual dialogue, when the printmaker interprets the text of an “absent” author, real dialogue when they cooperate, self-talk when the author and the printmaker are one and same person). The top Artist’s Book is the one that is invented, written (block-book or handly typesetted text), illustrated, set up, printed and published by the artist. Other criteria may be added which increase the value of the work: paper’s high quality and number of copies.

In the 15th century, the first illustrated books – block-books – serve as a model of the closest and most perfect union between the text and the picture, cut on the same side grain block. From the end of the 15th century, almost all illustrated books, starting from the incunabula, are printed using a combination of printing and printmaking. Mainly woodcuts, inside the text, the matrix of which was incorporated in the chase, but also full-page intaglio prints. The two sectors are developing at the same time, with new techniques and new achievements. The images “describe” or accompany narratives, poems, novels, or reinforce mainly scientific texts. Illustrating a book, the image is considered a work of art when produced from the authentic plate, as this has been the case till the end of the 18th century. At the beginning of the 19th century, stereotype, which is the first mean of reproduction of a form and of a printmaking matrix, is perfected and used for publications the number of which increases more and more. Then the authentic print starts to disappear from the illustrated books. Since, the image reproduction means are multiplied until digital printing. Illustrated book and printmaking went their separate ways. Books illustrated with authentic prints are very few and become objects for collectors.