Fokion Rok. Sculptor

Fokion Rok                                                             Φωκίων Ρωκ

Born 1891                                                                 Died 1944

 

He was a sculptor not merely in the meaning of a ‘master’ but in the meaning of ‘artist’ (1)

 

Section One, Number 383

The Family grave of Anna Mela.  Rok’s name is on the back of the stele.

Fokion Rok was a well known figure in the artistic milieu of his time. He was personable, suave, highly educated, and a lover of all art. You could almost inhale the artistic fragrance of Paris as he passed by, as one admirer put it. His name has become known all over Greece because of his creation of the central figure in the monument that is the Tomb of the Unknown Soldier in Athens’ Syntagma Square. It was a very controversial piece (maybe not his best work) that caused a lot of bad feeling at the time.  Like every other artist accepting commissions that were often decided by committees, Rok may have had to compromise his own aesthetic at times during his career.

His artistic contribution is much greater than any one work because he was a teacher and thinker as well as an excellent sculptor. With his writing he brought new  perspectives to the artists of his era.

Several sources mention that one of his works is in the First cemetery, the grave of the Saltafera (Σαλταφέρα) family. We have not been able to verify that and will continue to be on the lookout for it, hoping it is still there. But his own grave is there and that gives us the opportunity to explore the life of this man who contributed to many of the artistic trends in his era.  

 Act One: His Early Life

The Roque family settled in Greece in 1789.  In that year Pierre-Nicolas Roque came to Athens as French Consul at a time when Greece was still an Ottoman possession. One of his descendents was secretary in the Greek Embassy in London and Greek consul in Malta under the premiership of Spiridon Tricoupis. Our Fokion was born in Argostoli, Cephalonia in 1891 to Ioannis Rok, an officer in the Greek army. His wife, Lydia Woodley was English and died in childbirth leaving Fokion to be raised by his paternal uncle, Nikolaos, a superintendent  of the Pireaus- Athens- Peloponnesian Railway. Fokion’s father left the country after his wife’s death and died several years later.

Fokion grew up in a social milieu which offered him an easy entree into the world of Greece’s artistic movers and shakers. Athens was not a large city; the artistic and social elite knew each other very well.

 

 

Looking every inch the self possessed artist as a young man

In 1912 Fokion, at the age of 21, fought the First Balkan War as part of a volunteer brigade assisting the regular Greek army. (2) Two years later, in 1914, he entered the Athens School of Fine Arts. During that period, he also worked in the studio-workshop of sculptor Thomas Thomopoulos.  Thomopoulos was in his 40s then and at the height of his career.  

Fokion had many artistic irons in the fire at the time, writing being one of them.  He would remain interested in literature and in art theory all through his life. In 1917 he wrote his first article for the periodical «Ο Λογοτέχνης» (The Man of Letters). This first entry was on the sculptor Rodin who had died that same year.

1917 was also the year he went to Paris to the École Nationale Supérieure des Beaux-arts. While there he came into the orbit of the Bulgarian born, Greek sculptor Konstantinos Dimitriadis. Dimitriadis was well established with a  studio in Paris and one in London. He would enter Fokion’s life once more   after he came to Greece and became the director of the Athens School of Fine Arts

In 1919 Rok returned to Athens and he, along with painter Pericles Byzantios (Περικλής Βυζάντιος) and writer Pavlos Kalligas (Παύλος Καλλιγάς ), opened a studio- workshop  at Diogenous 4 in the Plaka. What a wonderful spot! It is still there on a small lane just east of The Tower of the Winds but is now the Platanos Taverna. You can still get an idea of what it must have been like. This building became a meeting place for many of the up and coming artists and writers of the day. 

 

 

The poet Sotiris Skipis (Σωτήρης Σκίπης) would write: It will be forever remembered - that atelier near the Tower of the Winds. So much artistic activity gathered in that old house. 

Fokion lounging in his Plaka studio

 

 I love this self portrait of Pericles Byzantios at work. It seems to project the self confidence and the essence of what these young artists were trying to accomplish.

In 1923-4 Rok returned to Paris to study sculpture at the Académie Julien while, at the same time, working with the newspaper Ταχυδρόμος-Ομόνοια writing about the art scene in Paris.

The Workshop of the Academie Julien. Rok is standing at the right of the picture.

 Act Two

Rok returned to Athens in 1925 and took part in group exhibitions. During this period he sculpted the bust of poet Aristotelis Valaoritis which is still in the National Gardens.

 

At this point in his career, he became interested in wood. He believed that wood offered an inherent flexibility and movement.

 

 A wooden bas relief

Folk art was another focus at this time.  After the Smyna debacle in 1922, many Greek artists were increasingly looking at local cultural and folk traditions as a basis for a new personal and national aesthetic. In 1927, with folk art expert Angeliki Hatzimichali he took part in an exhibition which was very well received at the time.

 

A figure created between 1925-30

  

Portrait of Rok around this period, painted by Pericles Byzantios

Rok became a founding member of the Artists’ Club «Ατελιέ» and in 1929 a founding member of the Association of Greek Sculptors (Σωματείο Ελλήνων Γλυπτών). This was also the year he married his first wife Nina, who had a gallery in Karitsi Square (just south of Klafhmonas Square in central Athens).

He had his fingers in so many pies. In May of 1930, he took part in the Second Delphic Festival organized by Angelos Sikelianos and his wife Eva by creating the Egyptian masks  (animal heads apparently) for Prometheus Bound. In that same year he became curator of sculpture in the Athens School of Fine Arts.  

 Act Three: The Crisis

 Rok and The Tomb of the Unknown Soldier

After the First World War, many countries decided to create a monument to those soldiers ‘ known only to God’  who had died during the terrible conflict. Today, visitors flock to Syntagama  and the tomb to see the changing of the guard and to feed the hundreds of  pigeons who have made the area their own. Few realize that the entire area they are standing on is the monument

 

The finished monument from above

 

It all began in 1926 when dictator Theodoros Pangalos (3) placed an advertisement in the newspaper inviting submissions. École des Beaux Arts architect Emmanuel Lazaridis won the design competition. At first there was some debate about where to place it. One idea was the area in front of the then Parliament Building on Stadiou Street, but  others favoured the area in front of the former royal palace above Syntagma Square. In 1929, Eleftherios Venizelos added his weight behind the former royal Palace  venue where the space required for a monument rivalling Paris’ Arc de Triomphe was available. This choice required a massive earth moving project to level the slope in front of the old palace before work could commence. Money problems sometimes delayed progress.

 

 

Α Lazaridis sketch

Originally, Lazaridis had chosen sculptor Thomas Thomopoulos to create the central tableau behind the eternal flame. Thomopoulos had proposed a bas relief with angels receiving the dead soldier. This ancient Greek motif had inherent Christian possibilities. (Of course these two artistic traditions have always blended nicely in Greek art). It would be a dramatic scene, full of pathos.

 

Thomopoulos’ Proposal

However, by 1930, Lazaridis had had a change of heart and awarded the central tableau to Fokion Rok. That it was a unanimous decision of the planning board in favour of his onetime apprentice did not please Thomopoulos who would later sourly comment that the soldier Rok depicted looked a lot like a dead fish.

There was a furor over the switch and many in the artistic community sided with Thomopoulos, crying foul, - that Rok had had the backing of the powerful voices, including that of his old friend   Constantinos Dimitriadis who was then a member of the board making the choice. The backers of Rok’s design responded that they had chosen it over  Thomopoulos’ because of its simplicity and ‘calming’ effect.

 Hmm

 

Rok’s final rendition is an echo of one of the well loved soldier figures from the pediment of the Archaic temple of Aphaia in Aegina. (now in Germany) :

 

To my mind, the archaic figure is far superior in every way. My judgment may have been influenced by Thomopoulos’ dead fish analogy. It is hard not to see the aptness of the description when looking at Rok’s soldier!

At the time, the Association of Sculptors dismissed Rok’s effort as a “badly executed prone body” (ξαπλωμένο κακότεχνο πτώμα). They had other complaints as well, one being the use of Italian rather than Greek artisans on the other parts of the memorial.

 

The Newspapers had a field day!

Venizelos, prime minister at the time, was unperturbed. Dimitriadis was a personal friend of his whom he had aided in his return to Athens and in becoming the director of the Athens School of Fine Arts. In support he said that even if Dimitriadis was a single Yes against a chorus of No’s, he would still take his part.

The Resolution

The monument with Rok’s bas relief, was unveiled with fanfare  in 1932 with foreign delegations present (Egypt, America, Yugoslavia, France, Italy, Poland, Romania, and Turkey). There was a military parade  and the eternal  flame was brought all the way from Achaia’s Agia Lavra, the traditional venue of the first uprising against the Turks in 1821. To the left and right of the tableau are quotations from Thucydides from his History of the Peloponnesian War: There is one empty bier made up for the unidentified ones and The whole earth is the sepulchre of famous men.

 

 

 

 

The Unveiling

 

The Denoument

Of course, Rok survived the controversy. He had his entire body of work to back him up. And many people did admire his work in Syntagma.

In 1936, at the age of 45, Rok married for the second time to Sophia Mela, the daughter of Vassilis M. Melas and Eleni Soutsos, both important families in the story of modern Greek history.(4) In 1937, their only child was born: Nikolaos Rok-Melas. The double surname is a popular way in modern Greece to announce important family ties.

During this last period of his life, Rok was involved in the attempt, through the Association of Greek Artists, in creating a lexicon of Greek artists and other literary pursuits. In 1939 he created the bust of Philhellene Chateaubriand which was placed in the Pedion tou Areos Park in central Athens:

 

Chateaubriand

He was named a special professor at the Athens School of Fine Arts and had an exhibition in 1940 at the Zappeion in Athens. He was at the height of his career.  

Then Came the Second World War

During the Greco-Italian phase of the war he, along with painter Argiro Umberto (Αργυρό Ουμβέρτο) and others travelled to Epirus and Albania to record the war for posterity. They presented the results of their work to the prestigious Parnassos Club. (5)

When the Germans invaded Athens, Sophia and young Nicolas fled to Aegina to the home of the Mavrokordatos family whereas Rok remained teaching in Athens and visited them when he could.

In 1944, he published the book Lessons in Art of Ingres, Rodin and Bourdelle «Μαθήματα τέχνης των Ενγκρ, Ροντέν, Μπουρντέλ». Ingres was the famous  painter; the other two sculptors of renown. 

 

 

 

Sadly, Rok died on March 3, 1944 at the age of 53.  His friend, the poet Sotiris Skipis, wrote:

 Fate has been unkind to Fokion Rok because it did not allow him to savour our freedom and it is impossible to accept the idea that he is no longer with us...  Of Fokion Rok, one could say that he was one of the last aristocrats.

It is a pity that there is so little written about Fokion Rok in English; he was such an interesting figure as well as an integral part of Athenian life during that era.

 

 

The Grave

 

 

Section One, Number 383

 

 

If you look hard, you can just make out the name ΦΩΚΙΟΝ ΡΩΚ on the back of the stele.

 

 The Map

 

 

Footnotes

 

(1)      A remark by fellow sculptor Demitrios Fiippotis

(2)      The Giribaldi Brigade

(3)      Theodoros Pangelos was an army man through and through, he is referred to as a constitutional dictator – only in Greece!

(4)      His wife was a sister to Pavlos Melas, one of Greece’s greatest heroes.

(5)      The Parnassos Club is still going strong at 8 karitsi Street just off Stadiou Street in the center of Athens.

Sources

There are very few English sources. This one is worth it for English speakers because of the photographs of his life – fascinating.

https://www.miet.gr/userfiles/books/pdf/RWK%202017.pdf