Iakovos Rizos or Iacovos Rizos (Ιάκωβος Ρίζος in Greek, Modern (1453-); pronounced as /iˈa.ko.vos ˈɾi.zos/), also known as Jacques Rizo,[1] (c. 1849 - 1926) was a Greek painter who worked primarily in Paris.
Rizos was born in Athens; he was the grandson of Iakovos Rizos Neroulos and his brother was a civil engineer.[2] He went to Paris as a young man, studied with Alexandre Cabanel at the École des Beaux Arts,[2] and spent his career there. He died there in 1926.[3]
Rizos was a friend of Renoir and associated with the Impressionists, and much admired Degas' work after he first moved to Paris, but his own style was academic.[4] [3] Many of his paintings portray elegantly dressed women; he less often painted landscapes, in an Impressionist-influenced style.[4] He exhibited a number of times at the Paris salons, beginning with a portrait of his sister, Mrs. Paparrigopoulos, which he re-worked for the 1878 Paris exposition.[2] In 1875 his portrait of "Miss R." in a black silk dress with violet sleeves was noted by one critic as one of the finest portraits in the show.[5] In 1877 his Indolence, a nude, was praised by one critic except for the execution of the head,[6] and by another praised for the colouration but faulted for the drawing, particularly of the hands and feet.[7]
Rizos' Athenian Evening or On the Terrace of 1897 won a silver medal at the 1900 Paris exposition and was praised at the 1899 art exhibition in Athens.[4] It depicts an officer talking to two women on a terrace at sunset, with the Acropolis in the background, in contrast to the more common depictions of Greece in 19th-century painting that focus on rural life.[8] It is a noted example of the juxtaposition of sophisticated urban life with the country's past grandeur, which was a theme of Greek artists in the late 19th and 20th centuries.[9] [10] It and a number of his other paintings are in the Coutlides Collection at the National Gallery of Greece;[4] there are also several in private collections in both Athens and Paris.[3]
At the 1897 salon, Albert-Gustave Belleroche exhibited a portrait of Rizo.[11] [12]