Monument to the dying warrior (Dimitris Kalamaras)
Category: Visual Arts > Public space
| Artist: | Dimitris Kalamaras |
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| Year: | 1971 |
| Genre: | Sculpture | Monument |
| Place: | Florina |
Censorship incidents
| 1971 | Fierce reactions against the installation of the “Monument to the dying warrior” by Dimitris Kalamaras
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| 1972 | Removal of the “Monument to the dying warrior” by Dimitris Kalamaras
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| 1975 | Attempt to replace the “Monument to the dying warrior” by Dimitris Kalamaras
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Description
The “Monument to the dying warrior” (1971) was the third monumental work that the Municipality of Florina awarded to the distinguished sculptor and Athens School of Fine Arts professor, Dimitris Kalamaras. The constant interventions on the part of Bishop Augustine Kantiotis of Florina, resulted in the removal of the monument during the Junta; both military and local authorities considered it “nationally degrading” and aesthetically unfit to represent the “Greek heroes”. The monument was unveiled, in Florina's main square as a memorial to the fallen. It remained a target for the bishop’s invective for months, on the grounds that it did not “depict the outstanding historical event of modern times” and was therefore disapproved of by “the incorruptible Greek soul”.
A new competition for the monument was announced in 1975. In the end, the competition was canceled, as there were no sculptors in the area who were willing to participate. After the artist’s death, and following the mobilisation of arts bodies with the support of the Chamber of Fine Arts of Greece (EETE), the work, which had been damaged during the years in which it was kept in the garbage truck depot, was restored and re-installed in the central square of Florina in 2006.
Penelope Petsini
Sources – Bibliography
- Ethnos (Florinis), 13/11/1971.
- Thessaloniki, 19/2/1993.
- Makedonia, 28/6/1998.
- Anna Moschona-Kalamara, «Kalamaras Dimitris» in P. Petsini and D. Christopoulos Dictionary of Censorship in Greece: Cachectic democracy - dictatorship - metapolitefsi, Athens: Kastaniotis 2018.
