BIOGRAPHY / VIDEO: Yannis Gourzis

In 1973, Yannis Gourzis opened his own studio, 'Byzantine Icons'. From 1974 to 1979 he studied printmaking at the Anotati Scholi Kalon Technon. The studio closed down in 1990. By that time, Gourzis had been working for the Bank of Greece as an engraver from December 1984. In October 1992 he became a Proferssor at the Athens School of Fine Arts, which he still is today.

When the Hellenic Post had decided to mark the 150th anniversary of the first Greek stamps, the Large Hermes Heads, with a stamp set reproducing that first design, but then in intaglio, they contacted Gourzis in the Spring of 2010. The issue was formally commissioned on 12 January 2011, and Gourzis had until the end of April to finish his engraving, because the stamps would have to be issued on 1 October 2011.

It would be the first time that a recess-printed stamp would be produced completely in Greece by Greeks. Up until then such stamps had always been (partly) created abroad.

Gourzis posted a video on Youtube of him engraving the stamps.



You will find Yannis Gourzis' database HERE.