Charles Stratos, French (1953 - )

Born Charles-Athanas-Stratos Papadopoulos in 1953 in France…Charles uses his third given name “Stratos” professionally. At the young age of 14, he began his love of art, by studying architecture…which built his imagination and was his artistic making.

In 1972 he created his first paintings and 1983 marked his first attempt at sculpture. First on wood with the appearance of triangular shapes and in the same vein, in 1988, he participated in the casting of his first bronze “Sapho”, in figuration transposed from geometry into space.

On the same themes, between painting and sculpture, his search for style became a consuming passion that captured him full time. From the 90s his work was noticed by the director of the Pharos gallery in Marseille. Pharos was intrigued by the unusual stylistic approach for the time and exhibited some of his works permanently. Then a few months later, in the heart of the historic center of Avignon, The Vernissage gallery organized his first sculpture exhibition. Shortly afterwards and still near the Palais des Papes, the Charton gallery, mainly specialized in contemporary Provençal painting, showcased a Stratos painting that provoked, by its quirky style, a real surprise to the art gallery patrons.

His first major solo exhibition abroad took place in 1991 at the Novosti press agency in Moscow, where this French artist’s modernity and the poetic tenderness of his work seduced the Russian public.

In 1993, he opened his first personal gallery in Nîmes, especially dedicated to his bronze mutants with geometric symbols and multicolored patinas. These pieces already illustrated the concept of the family resonating with his paintings, in the same search for simplicity and spiritual elevation.

Since then, he has been exhibited all over the World in various Museums and Galleries and is collected Internationally.