Painting Exhibition “A Journey – Inspirational Insights” Chania 3rd to 9th May

In the late 18th and early 19th centuries, Western Europe re-discovered the charm of Greek antiquity. Young travelers with a romantic mood visited the monuments of the ancient world in Greece.

“The exhibition presents works by the Austrian romantic landscape painter and portrait painter Johann Ender ((1793-1854) from his tour in Turkey and Greece with the Hungarian István Széchenyi”.

WHEN: 3rd until 9th May, 9 am until 2 pm
Opening of the exhibition on 3rd May, 3 pm.

WHERE: CAM –  Centre for Mediterranean Architecture, Old Port in Chania. For map click here.

The exhibition is organized  by the Hungarian Embassy in Athens and the kind contribution of the Embassy of Austria to Athens, the Municipality of Chania and KEPPEDIK-KAM.

István Széchenyi (1791-1860) was the son of a rich aristocratic family of Hungary. In the summer of 1818 he began his first trip to the South-East. Johann Nepomuk Ender, an Austrian romantic landscape painter and portrait painter, joined him.
Johann Ender (1793-1854), a son of a poor  merchant family, graduated from the famous Academy of Fine Arts “St. Anna” in Vienna and soon became a recognized and sought-after artist. With Széchenyi’s family he became known as the painter of the noble class of the Habsburg Empire.

They traveled by ship and on horseback to many parts of Greece and  the major centers of the Ottoman Empire. For Széchenyi, this journey was not just a laborious, adventurous and dangerous research trip, it was also an interior journey that radically overturned his system of values. An unpredictable and light-minded young man emerged as a thoughtful noble modernizer who wished to elevate his underdeveloped country and in the coming decades would lay the foundations of a modern Hungary.

Source: KAM