Voula Papaïoannou (1898–1990) was a

Greek Greek may refer to: Anything of, from, or related to Greece, a country in Southern Europe: *Greeks, an ethnic group *Greek language, a branch of the Indo-European language family **Proto-Greek language, the assumed last common ancestor of all kno ...

photographer, known for her photography of Greece, its people and its landscape.

Biography

Papaïoannou was born in

Lamia Lamia (; ), in ancient Greek mythology, was a child-eating monster and, in later tradition, was regarded as a type of night-haunting spirit or "daimon". In the earliest myths, Lamia was a beautiful queen of ancient Libya who had an affair with ...

Greece Greece, officially the Hellenic Republic, is a country in Southeast Europe. Located on the southern tip of the Balkan peninsula, it shares land borders with Albania to the northwest, North Macedonia and Bulgaria to the north, and Turkey to th ...

, but grew up in

Athens Athens ( ) is the Capital city, capital and List of cities and towns in Greece, largest city of Greece. A significant coastal urban area in the Mediterranean, Athens is also the capital of the Attica (region), Attica region and is the southe ...

. She studied at the Polytechnic University of Athens and developed an interest in photography. With the outbreak of

World War II World War II or the Second World War (1 September 1939 – 2 September 1945) was a World war, global conflict between two coalitions: the Allies of World War II, Allies and the Axis powers. World War II by country, Nearly all of the wo ...

, she took up

documentary photography Documentary photography usually refers to a popular form of photography used to chronicle events or environments both significant and relevant to history and historical events as well as everyday life. It is typically undertaken as professional ph ...

and began to photograph and document social subjects during the duration of the German and Italian occupation of Greece. She turned her camera to troops departing for the front line, and to the casualties of war, raising awareness of the various humanitarian issues such as the Great Famine which arose out of the occupation. As Athens suffered a starvation crisis, Papaïoannou photographed emaciated children, providing an account of the horrors of war on the civilian population. After the liberation, Papaïoannou became a member of the photographic unit of the

UNRRA United Nations Relief and Rehabilitation Administration (UNRRA, pronounced ) was an international relief agency founded in November 1943 on the joint initiative of the United States, United Kingdom, USSR, and the Republic of China. Its purpose ...

(United Nations Relief and Rehabilitation Administration), touring the Greek countryside recording the hard conditions of rural life. Papaïoannou's attention toward the hardships of the Greek population was not in the least romantic or touristic, but instead honestly portrayed them as proud and independent, optimistic for the future despite poverty.

Photography

Papaïoannou worked in the social documentarian tradition of photography. Her work reflects the dominant representational paradigm of '

humanist photography Humanist Photography, also known as the School of Humanist Photography,Chalifour, Bruno, 'Jean Dieuzaide, 1935-2003' in ''Afterimage'' Vol. 31, No. 4, January–February 2004 manifests the Age of Enlightenment, Enlightenment philosophical system in ...

' prominent in postwar Europe.Voula Papaioannou Cabinet
/ref> Her work was widely printed in the photographic press, and was published in book form through the Swiss publisher La Guilde du Livre in the 1950s.

Books

* 1953. ''La Grèce : à ciel ouvert'' (Lausanne: La Guilde du Livre), in French. . * 1956. ''Iles Grecques'' (Lausanne: La Guilde du Livre), in French. .

References

{{DEFAULTSORT:Papaioannou, Voula 1898 births 1990 deaths Greek photographers Greek women photographers Artists from Athens 20th-century Greek photographers 20th-century Greek women artists