Three Graces, 1974

Christos Karas is a member of the dynamic Sixties generation that produced important painters and revitalized easel painting. His painting is anthropocentric. In the 1970s, impressed by Pop Art and American Hyperrealism, Karas invented a personal style in which human figures, flowers, fruits and objects are depicted in a manner influenced by graphic arts. In The Three Graces, the semi-nude female figures covered by billowing white mantles, atmospherically drawn with skillful chiaroscuro, stand out like spectral presences against a dark ground. In the foreground, a still life with fruit is depicted in the same manner. Through a half-open door we can make out an ancient-style white helmet placed on a tall rectangular plinth, which casts its dark shadow on the wall. With its spectral female figures and heteroclectic objects, the picture has an enigmatic and magical atmosphere. The composition, with its vertical elements that bisect the space according to the golden mean, is well-balanced. Except for the color in the still life, the painting is virtually monochromatic.