(b Alona, 24 Feb 1910; d Nicosia, 18 Nov 1993). Cypriot painter, engraver and teacher. He finished his studies at the Higher School of Fine Arts in Athens in 1938, where he showed independence from his teachers by studying, and being influenced by, the works of Cézanne. Kanthos then returned to Cyprus and worked as a painter and teacher based in Nicosia. From early on his main interest lay in the landscapes of Cyprus. As well as painting pure landscapes, many of his subjects are taken from rural and village life, as in The Belfry (1952; Nicosia, State A.G.), although harmonization of surfaces and colours and the schematization of forms and backgrounds always went beyond exterior detail to provide a sense of place and inner meaning. His recurring hallmark is a vibrancy and purity of colour. After 1960 Kanthos’s work acquired a new immediacy and expressive power. The schematized forms and broad surfaces of Village (artist’s col., see Christou, fig. 9) are characteristic of his understanding of local atmosphere and his ability to express the feeling that underlies external appearance. His engravings provide a marked contrast to his paintings. Vigorous and dramatic, and often with considerable expressive force, they tend to be frugally composed and contain powerful symbolic content. On the Rock of Patience (1976; Nicosia, State A.G.), executed in 1976 as part of the series Hard Times, depicts a characteristically monumentalized seated male figure, the contrasts of light and shade highlighting his strength and long endurance. Kanthos’s later engravings are particularly striking for their expression of intensities of inner mood and emotion.

• Kanthos, Telemachos
  • Cyprus, §V, 2: Ottoman and modern architecture, painting and sculpture