Olga's Gallery

The most unusual painter in 16th-century Europe, El Greco combined the strict Byzantine style of his homeland, Greece, with influences received during his studies in Venice and the medieval tradition of the country where he worked, Spain.
            Domenicos Theotocopoulos, later called El Greco, the Greek, by the Spaniards, was born in Candia, on the island of Crete. Nothing is known of his parentage. He was trained as icon-maker in a monastery; he then went to Venice (soon after 1560), where Titian became his greatest mentor. El Greco, however, obtained very little influence from his master; but a certain influence of Bassano, Baroccio, Veronese, and Tintoretto could be felt but on the whole his works are very individual and distinct. In 1570, El Greco went by way of Parma (where he appreciated Correggio) to Rome, where he met Michelangelo. He criticized his Last Judgment severely, and offered to produce a better composition. But on the whole Michelangelo and the Central Italian Mannerists stimulated him. Read El Greco's Full Biography