Takis Vassilakis. Art exhibition, Paris, 1964.

Vassilakis Takis (born October 25, 1925) is an artist living in Greece. Adopted by France, his works can be found in many public locations in and around Paris.
Photograph by Simos Tsapnidis, 1964.

Greek Ship EURYMEDON and sailors. Hamburg, 1958

 The Greek ship EURYMEDON and some of the greek sailors. Hamburg.
Photographs by Simos Tsapnidis, April 12, 1958

John Spartakos. Interview, 1999.

John Spartakos (Γιάννης Σπάρτακος) was one of the greatest musicians of Greece. His song “Greek Bolero” (Θα σε πάρω να φύγουμε), is the first greek song that became an international hit, 1944. John Spartakos talks with the journalist Manolis Daloukas, 1999.

The Flying Shack, headquarters of the Greek Existentialists. Athens, 1953.

 Flying Shack (Ιπτάμενη Παράγκα) was the name of the wooden house of Simos Tsapnidis (Σίμος Τσαπνίδης), leader of the Greek Existentialists. Here, hundreds of youths used to hang out, from 1953 to 1956. They formed an art group, deep in the heart ofAthens.

The group, involved theater, poetry, dance, visual arts and music. They danced and played a strange kind of music, a mixture of boogie and swing, but with improvisations, in a dada spirit.

Many traveling artists and political fugitives, found a refuge here.  Police termed the Flying Sack, a “home of orgies” and closed it, by 1955. Simos Tsapnidis, fled Greece, in 1956, and traveled all over Europe, for 20 years

Greek sailors. Hamburg, 1963.

Greek sailors  at the greek bar-restaurant "Greek Corner (ΕΛΛΗΝΙΚΗ ΓΩΝΙΑ)", Hambourg, 1963.
Sailors dance to the rembetika and demotica (greek traditional )songs. A group of greek musicians, play the music.

All photographs by Simos Tsapnidis, 1963.

Lazy on a sunny afternoon.London, 1967

Lazy on a sunny afternoon. Photographs by Simos Tsapnidis, London, 1967

Mods outside the club Tiles. Bee Gees Live Performance,1967

Mods waiting for Bee Gees live performance, outside the historic club TILES, London.
Support group was The Tangerine Peel
All photographs by Simos Tsapnidis, 1967.

Amsterdam, 1958

All phtotographs by Simos Tsapnidis, 1958
Copyright Manolis Daloukas

Morka- Just Like Ann (Dorian Kokas).

Morka (Dorian Kokas, Michalis Orphanides, George Tambakopoulos, Antonis Bravos, Paul Papadeas and Pamela Leake) was one of the best groups of the psychedelic period in Greece (1970-73).
Leader of the group was Dorian Kokas.
All members were greeks, except Pamela, who fled England, after she finished school and traveled  to Greece, but then, she never went back

Oslo, 1960.

Photographs by Simos Tsapnidis, 1960

Protests against the Vietnam War. London, 1967.

Protests against the Vietnam War.
Trafalgar Square. 
Photographs by Simos Tsapnidis, May of 1967 

Nikolas Asimos. Athens, 1983

 Nikolas Asimos (Νικόλας Άσιμος) (1949-1988) and crew at Kosmopolitan (summer theater), Athens, Greece. Asimos (the man with the white shirt) was the leader of the art group KROK, that flourished in Athens between 1976 and 1988.

 Krok primarily involved music, theater, visual arts, and poetry.
 The man with the cane, is Litis (Λήτης), a punk-rock  singer. Man with the guitar is Tolis Voultzatis, and the girl is Litsa Perraki).
A sound document of Asimos's live performance, is  Romios (The Greek), a song born out of Asimos's negative reaction to the horrors of some "greeks" (video at the bottom of the post) . 

Photographs by Manolis Daloukas, 1983

    Romios (Ο Ρωμιός)
    Live at summer theater Kosmopolitan, 1983.

Young Socialists. London. 1967.

 Photographs by Simos Tsapnidis. 1967

The Mermaid Cafe. Matala, Crete. 1970

This is the original Mermaid Cafe, a small restaurant and cafe, at Matala, Crete.

The sign of Mermaid (top picture) was a painting on the wall, made by Penelope, the sister of the owner, Stelios.

Photographs of Paris. 1957

 Photographs by Simos Tsapnidis. 1957

Greeks protesting against greek military regime. Paris, 1968

All Photographs by Simos Tsapnidis, 1967
Copyright Manolis Daloukas
More in our ARchives, all in High Resolution

On April 21, 1968, at Parisian streets, hundreds of Greeks, protested against greek military regime (Junta). Most of them were students (and a part members of  Rigas Ferraios organization). They were carrying Greek flags,and protest banners with written slogans like "Vive la Resistance du peuple Grec" .

Konstantinos Karamanlis. Paris, 1965.

 Konstantinos Karamanlis. with his wife Amalia Megapanou, at the Cathredale Saint Stephane, 25th of March 1965.

In the 1963 election the National Radical Union, under his leadership, was defeated by the Center Union under George Papandreou. Disappointed with the result, Karamanlis fled Greece under the name Triantafyllides. He spent the next 11 years in self-imposed exile in Paris, France

All photographs by Simos Tsapnidis

Andreas Papandreou. Press Conference after his arrival in Paris. 1968

  


When the Greek Colonels led by Georgios Papadopoulos seized power in April 1967, Andreas Papandreou was incarcerated.
 Under heavy pressure from American academics and intellectuals, such as John Kenneth Galbraith, a friend of Andreas since their Harvard days, the military regime released Andreas on condition that he leave the country.

All photographs by Simos Tsapnidis