Modern Love: Couples Who Shaped the Culture of 20th-Century Greece

One Single and Eternal Greece –Rallou Manou and Pavlos Mylonas

“Δεν υπάρχει άρχαία και νεα Ελλάδα, αλλά μόνον Ελλάδα, αιώνια, ζωντανή και ωραία” (Ελληνικό Χορόδραμα 1950-1960 1961, p8) 

“There is no distinction between ‘ancient’ Greece and ‘modern’ Greece – there is just one single and eternal Greece, beautiful and palpitating with life.”

The choreographer Rallou Manou was a pivotal figure in the thriving cultural scene of mid-century Greece. Beginning as a student of dance with Koula Pratsika, she broadened her exposure to contemporary currents in dance with studies in Paris (1934), then Munich (1935-37). After the war, she took a troupe to Paris to perform folk dances in traditional costume, accompanied by music on traditional instruments. In 1947, she visited the school of Martha Graham in New York. 

The cumulative power of these experiences, united with her vision of the unity of Greek culture, would soon find its expression through the Helleniko Chordrama (Greek Dance Drama), which she founded in 1951. Her all-encompassing response to the quest for Greekness at the heart of the artistic movement known as the “Generation of the ‘30s” involved a synthesis of various aspects of Greek identity – ancient drama, folk culture, and Byzantine tradition – expressed through the vocabulary of modern dance. 

This “Gesamtkunstwerk” of Greekness involved collaboration with the most dynamic artists and intellectuals of her generation, among them the composers Manos Hadjidakis and Mikis Theodorakis, the shadow puppet artist Eugenios Spatharis, the painters Yannis Tsarouchis, Yiannis Moralis, Spyros Vassiliou, and Nikos Hadjikyriakos-Ghika, the writers Odysseas Elytis and Nikos Kazantzakis, and the director Michael Cacoyiannis. She would also collaborate with international artists, and represented Greek culture abroad, touring with her works in the Balkans, Egypt, South Africa, Iran, the US, and the Soviet Union.

Her husband, the architect Pavlos Mylonas, achieved through his work what Manou did through hers: giving modernist artistic expression depth, identity, and cultural relevance. Joining other noted architects of his generation such as Dimitris Pikionis and Aris Konstantinidis, Mylonas was a strong proponent of critical regionalism: giving modernist buildings a sense of place in response to both their natural setting (landscape and light) and their cultural context. This resulted in a specifically Greek modernism, a regional response to an international architectural style.

Mylonas, architect and professor at the Athens School of Fine Arts, was truly a scholar. His study in photographs and drawings of the neoclassical and eclectic buildings of Athens and of examples of its vernacular architecture spanned four decades. He also compiled a vast archive detailing the architecture and the topography of Mt Athos, the work of countless visits over his lifetime. 

This intimate familiarity with Greek vernacular architecture added depth to his work, resulting in an approach to modernism that incorporated cultural identity while also responding to the natural environment. His buildings of note include the Mt Parnes Hotel, a high-profile project on Mt Parnitha for EOT, the National Tourism Organization of Greece. 

Mylonas was acquainted with many of the era’s most interesting artists. He collaborated with them as Manou did through the Helliniko Chorodrama. For the Mt Parnes Hotel, he incorporated a notable work by Yiannis Moralis, while the pool garden, with original rocks left in situ, was the work of Nikos Hadjikyriakos-Ghika. He also designed the Officers’ Club of Thessaloniki, one of the city’s most prominent buildings, located across from the White Tower; its unusual concave façade seems to communicate directly in form with the round tower, while his playfully modernist handling of volume and his cantilevered balcony serve as a modernist response to the 15th century monument. The unexpected use of deep red and raw golden stone help to further emphasize the connection to the city’s Byzantine heritage. 

Another interesting work is the one he did for himself: Rallou House. The couple, close with nearly all the key figures of contemporary culture, had collaborated a number of times with the painter Nikos Hadjikyriakos-Ghika. When Ghika engaged Mylonas to design a studio for him at his home on Hydra, the architect became enchanted with the island. He bought a number of small adjacent traditional houses above the port and, after restoring them, connected them to create a single beautiful home, named for his wife. It’s there still, and sometimes available for rent.