What if Engonopoulos had Instagram in 2025?
What would it be like if Engonopoulos had Instagram in 2025?
Epaminondas Petros Krietsiotis, Georgios Roussis, Ioannis Tziavaras
What would it be like if Nikos Engonopoulos, one of the most important representatives of surrealism in Greece, personally managed an Instagram account in 2025? With this question as a starting point, we created the account called "@n.eggonopoulos", attempting to bridge the artist's poetry and visual artistry with the experiences and expressive forms of the Greeks of the new millennium. We chose the social network "Instagram" as it is a dynamic platform, which offers many different forms of expression, combining both speech and visual form. That is why it is a suitable means of communication for such a multidimensional project. This initiative is not just a digital exercise in creativity, but a deep research and artistic approach to the presence and identity of the creator in the contemporary digital world, while at the same time it includes an attempt at philological analysis. Besides, this research paper was created in the context of the conference "The Engonopoulos Archive – Digital Archiving as a Means of Saving, Inspiring and Disseminating the Cultural Footprint" which gave us the research "freedom" to choose a contemporary and original topic.
How to work
The work was based on four main steps: The first was archival research, which included the collection of poems, paintings, manuscripts and letters by Engonopoulos from the archival collection of the Athens School of Fine Arts (ASFA). The study of this rich material has helped us to understand the multi-layered personality of the artist, who moves between poetry and painting, with references to both Greek culture and international artistic trends. In addition, it is worth mentioning that the exposure to such diverse archival material, which even includes personal correspondence and photographs from the artist's childhood and adult life, contributed decisively to the understanding of Engonopoulos' personality, giving us the opportunity to get to know him in real depth. After all, how else could we successfully create his personal Instagram account without "really knowing" him?
The second step concerned the combination of visual and written language. Here we attempted to match excerpts from poetry, correspondence, lectures and even from unpublished manuscripts of Engonopoulos with specific paintings. The goal was to create posts (publications) that do not function simply as reproductions of the works, but as new, complex artistic products. Through the combination of speech and image, forms have emerged that address today's viewer/reader, following a modern way of artistic expression, but remaining faithful to the spirit of the artist.
The third step was poetry with the help of Artificial Intelligence (AI). We created a new poetic text, based on a painting by Engonopoulos, using artificial intelligence tools. This process allowed us to examine the limits of imitation and authenticity within the digital environment. To what extent can an AI system appropriate the voice of a poet? How does the perception of poetry change when it is directly related to image and technology? These questions have been a guide in our search.
Finally, the fourth step was to create the Instagram account itself. In particular, the content was organized into various formats: simple posts, carousel posts, stories, and highlights. Each format was chosen based on the type of content and the type of communication we sought. Special attention was paid to the adaptation of Engonopoulos' work to the data of contemporary digital culture. That is, how can a poem be presented in a post, keeping intact the artist's poetic flow? How do you bring out irony and surrealism through photos and captions? In addition, a noteworthy mention is the emphasis we gave to the observance of ethics during the account creation process, such as the choice to remain closed, i.e. without it being possible for a third user to see its content, always with respect to the legal framework that surrounds the artist's archive at the Athens School of Fine Arts and with appreciation for the contribution of Nikos Engonopoulos.
The Publications
All the paintings used in the account were taken from the website of the research center for the certification, conservation and restoration of works of art "Nikias". (http://www.nikias.gr/view_artist_additional.php?prod_id=724&mode=paintings)
Profile Picture
For a profile picture, we did not use the classic, black-and-white photograph of Engonopoulos that we find in his articles and books, but the painting "Self-Portrait" (1935). This choice lies in the informal establishment of the Instagram platform as a means of sharing art, interacting with the public and connecting the artistic community, which allows an artist to escape the narrow confines of the "personal account" - which would most likely be accompanied by a profile photo. (Tunnikmah, 2024)
Posts
As our first publication we chose the painting "Rite of Spring" (1981) accompanied by the following excerpt from the poem "The Goal-Posts":
At the goal-post
children
in the goalpost!
[...]
Awake
[...]
don't start falling
The goals
rain
and
We are defeated.
(Εγγονόπουλος, Στην κοιλάδα με τους ροδώνες: είκοσι έγχρωμους πίνακες και ένα σχέδιο)
The main pursuit behind this post was the original approach of surrealist symbolic motifs, in the style of Engonopoulos, through the creative initiative of a group of students in the year 2025. As part of this effort for surreal composition, we created the following caption, which we attributed as follows to the conference:
"Apart from the visual similarity of the "spears" that surround the supposedly spring woman with the football goalposts, there is also an abstract but established correlation of the coming of spring with the concept of victory over darkness in the context of a circular battle, meaning both Christian and Greek and directly related to the abstract Mediterranean virtue of Engonopoulos. In a way, football itself is a ritual as well as the latent war struggle that exists in both works in favor of endangered values, a call to which they are both. Either from the poetic subject to the reader, or from the "spring" to the lads."
This caption does not exist on Instagram, because we judge that the artist would not explain his correlations, as is customary in surrealism. Methodologically, the above analysis aims only to approach the reasoning process of surrealist artistic creation.
Then, we meet the first carousel post, i.e. the possibility that the platform gives us to post more than one photo in the same publication, where on the left we see the original sketch of the painting "The Airport" (1959) and on the right its complete form. As a description we used one of his lectures entitled "Painting and Free Design": (Instagram, n.d.)
The drawing is made from the natural, that is, from the naked body of a man or a woman. In the human body, the future architect will study the harmony of lines, shapes and tones. From the study of the human body, he will begin to understand the harmony of the universe as closely as possible. After all, man is going to be housed and man, again, will be the climate on which the architect, and the Greek architect, will base his every creation. The study of Color complements the study of the nude. The study of Color follows the study of Drawing. The student will become acquainted with the properties of colors and the laws that govern colors in nature and in the Fine Arts.
This choice lies in the fact that almost all of Engonopoulos' works are available on the internet, with many of them having earlier forms in the form of sketches or black and white. Therefore, he may have presented all kinds of his work, accompanying it with his views and knowledge of art. In short, as he broadcast them at the Polytechnic, he would do exactly the same in the vast world of the internet.
Then, we see the painting "The Two Brothers: Sleep and Death" (1963) accompanied by an excerpt from the poem "The Voices":
The voices
vibrate
first thunder, then
thunderer
and faster
in the alley
and suddenly reveal the eternal secrets
(Εγγονόπουλος, Η επιστροφή των πουλιών: Ποιήματα, 1946)
We thought that Engonopoulos, being a dynamic personality with an innate element of surrealism, would like to pay tribute to the victims of the Tempi tragedy, commenting in this way on an issue that shakes social events. However, this publication would be made in the context of purely artistic expression and not with selfish political or activist motives. The choice of this publication was based on an in-depth study of the artist's work, mainly through the Archives of the Athens School of Fine Arts, which led us to the conclusion that he drew inspiration from current events of the time, such as his works stemming from the German Occupation and the Greek Civil War.
In the second carousel post we used the painting "Orpheus, Hermes and Eurydice" (1949). However, the archive from which we inspired this publication called the painting in question "Orpheus" and that is why we used this name, accompanying it with the poem of the same name:
Orpheus was never - never - comforted by anything
For the double loss
of Euridice:
On the other hand, - for a while - he would sing a song to us in his marazi
On the other hand, - for a while -
the colors
he was fascinated
with their infinite varieties
and the coincidental
their combinations of words
Once - against the sun
the kingdom -
watch out for us in the blue sky
Charming Rows
Clouds
-for the fact that in Kavouri there was once a gendarmerie
He cried out in repentance:
"Behold the clouds of Engonopoulos!"
But these - really -
were not the clouds of Engonopoulos
They were knives
Blades
Sharpened camels and hats
On the blue breasts
They were holding
the cruelest of Thrace, the virgins
And she is brandishing
The cruel virgins in their aching hands
With these, I say, they fell upon him:
They slaughtered him
they tore him to pieces
Orpheus
(Εγγονόπουλος, ΤΡΙΑ ΠΟΙΗΜΑΤΑ & ΕΝΑΣ ΠΙΝΑΚΑΣ, 1975)
This combination emerged from the Archive, from which we drew the painting and the poem, entitled "Three Poems & One Painting", reprint of the magazine "Spira". The connection between the painting and the poem is clear, which makes this publication quite understandable.
Then, we see the work "Odysseus and Calypso" (1956) created using egg tempera on wood, a practice that the poet used mainly in illustrations, while for a description we chose an excerpt from the poem "Hymn of Praise for the Women We Love":
If the women we love swan parks live only in our hearts, their wings are the wings of angels.
(Σουλογιάννη, 2022)
We noticed that Engonopoulos' work, both as a writer and as a visual artist, is permeated by an eroticism. This element seems to be a key characteristic of the artist and man Engonopoulos, a fact that we have ascertained from his letters to his wife, Lena.
The last carousel post is the most peculiar, using the painting "The Sailor" (1948) and the following poem entitled "The Sailor Who Survived Time":
He sat still
in a blue chair
with fingers dipped in Cuban cigars
And a red siren to sing to him
from the glory of the sunken Atlantis.
On the table —
a glass of water,
A cup of coffee
and an invisible scarf
who hides the secrets of the world
His face has no past.
only shade from summers
and memories of islands that never existed.
He is not a traveler;
He is not a poet.
is a still gaze
on the façade of a house
who is waiting to be resurrected
Love.
And when it blows from the west,
The door does not close.
Only silence grows
and it becomes the sea.
Do you notice anything strange? This work was presented at the workshop "The Engonopoulos Archive – Digital Archiving as a Means of Saving, Inspiring and Disseminating the Cultural Footprint" and the majority of the audience did not perceive anything unusual. However, this particular poem is a product of the Artificial Intelligence tool "Chat GPT", and not a creation of the artist himself. The logic behind the creation of such a publication is based on the issue of the ethical use of AI, but also the existential and ethical debate that arises and would concern the artist directly.
Surrealist thinking is lexicized by AI with ease, limiting the human artistic factor and posing a threat to the artistic world. According to a recent survey by the University of Vermont among 516 artists or people working in artistic professions, 61.87% believe that AI technologies pose a threat to art. Through contact with the archive, we speculated that the artist would be in the mood to experiment with the audience using a poem created by Chat GPT and presenting it as his own, testing the limits of our vigilance against plagiarism. (J. Lovato, 2024)
How did we create the poem in question? We introduced the following command into Chat GPT:
"The attached painting is called "The Sailor" and is by the artist Nikos Engonopoulos, who was also a poet. I want you to write me a poem that can be connected to this particular painting. The poem must be written in the poetic way and style of Engonopoulos"
Our goal was to highlight the issue in a way that would honor his character, as we studied it in his letters and lectures. It is worth mentioning that the educated audience understood and highlighted the deviant nature of the poem, while the uneducated audience did not seem to recognize it.
Next, we see one of the best-known paintings by the artist "Poet and Muse" (1939) which we accompanied with the following excerpt from the poem "Sonnet rather pessimistic":
to hope - to always hope - that among the
people
who are ravaged by the terrible "ease" -
you will meet old souls in ways
that are governed by kindness - desire for kindness - tranquility
(Εγγονόπουλος, ΣΟΝΝΕΤΟ ΜΑΛΛΟΝ ΑΠΑΙΣΙΟΔΟΞΟ, n.d.)
The combination of the concept of hope with the visual depiction of the muse in the painting was structured in the context of the creative freedom provided by the nature of the work in question and our attempt to capture Engonopoulos' way of thinking. We connect the inspiration that the muse gives, with the semantic charge that surrounds her as an ancient goddess of the arts, in the form of a violin in the bizarre endless form that the artist gives her, with the hope that the poem promotes. In particular, the hope of meeting gentle souls and the generosity of the muse, within the emotional world of the individual, are paralleled in an abstract and purely surrealistic way. After all, "Surrealism is based on the belief in the higher reality of certain previously neglected forms, in the omnipotence of the dream, and in the selfless play of thought." Therefore, in our opinion, Engonopoulos, as a traditional surrealist, would have combined the above poem with the painting in question almost "naturally".(Breton, 1969)
We continue with another painting from 1939 entitled "Synthesis (from the Revolution)" which we accompanied with an excerpt from the manuscript of Nikos Engonopoulos entitled "The Incorruptibles" which we had the opportunity to admire for ourselves in the Engonopoulos Archive at the Athens School of Fine Arts:
Freedom is as necessary for man in order to live, as much as the air, the breath, and the bread. I began the painting when the threat to the highest human dignity had taken shape [...]In
my works I have always avoided the occasional. But for Freedom nothing is occasional. Its issues, loss, regain, are of immediate and eternal topicality. Freedom in life, in art, in reflection.
Engonopoulos was an artist who considered freedom as a supreme ideal. This fact is evident both from his writings (the above manuscript, the poem "Bolivar" etc.) and from his art, which is noticeably more "liberated" compared to the conditions of the time due to the surrealist thought that accompanies it.
The last publication combined the painting "The Sharpener" (1972) with an excerpt from the poem "Tram and the Acropolis":
What a sorrow it would be—my God—what a sorrow
if the hope of the marbles had comforted my heart; the expectation of a brilliant ray
that would give new life
to the magnificent ruins
(Εγγονόπουλος, ΜΗΝ ΟΜΙΛΕΙΤΕ ΕΙΣ ΤΟΝ ΟΔΗΓΟΝ · ΤΑ ΚΛΕΙΔΟΚΥΜΒΑΛΑ ΤΗΣ ΣΙΩΠΗΣ, 1966)
The above choice was based, initially, on the view of the Acropolis offered by this painting in combination with the act of sharpening. In an attempt to think like the surrealist artist, we considered this act as an "expectation of a brilliant ray/ that will give new life / to the magnificent ruins".
On a second level, we considered that the creator-sharpener embodies the hope of the marbles referred to in the poem, possibly the sword can also function symbolically as the so-called new life of the ruins. Subsequently, the Tram is an emblematic means of transport for Athenians in their daily work, with its history starting from 1882, which makes it a historical and "given" element of the city. In the same way, the sharpener in the painting of the same name, does his daily work with his back turned to the Acropolis, the most important historical element of Athens, precisely because it is a "given" characteristic of the capital.(Σαν Σήμερα, n.d.)
Highlights
The first highlights we published were titled "Theatre" and concerned Engonopoulos' creations related to theatre. But what are the highlights?
Instagram enables its users to post stories, i.e. their daily moments, and share them for a short period of time (24 hours). Then, you are given the option to save the stories for a long time in a separate area of the profile called "highlights". (Instagram, n.d.)
As is evident above, the artist had been involved in various visual aspects of the theatre. More specifically, we distinguish sets, posters and many costumes. The style in many of these creations on the one hand follows the usual motifs of the artist, i.e. tall people, absence of facial features and neoclassical architecture. On the other hand, in some of his works he has included both facial features and more modern aesthetics.
The second highlights we created are titled "Press of Yesterday" and they are nothing different from the obvious. In the archive of Engonopoulos at the Athens School of Fine Arts, we came across some clippings from newspapers that the artist himself had in his personal archive. These clippings were, essentially, references to him related to his poetry, his paintings, his contribution to the world of theatre and his surrealist art, as well as articles he had written himself. Therefore, these publications were of great importance to the artist and we considered it very likely that he wanted to share them with the world, as parts of his imprint in the Greek artistic – and not only – environment.
Conclusions
The present paper, in response to the original question "what would it be like if Nikos Engonopoulos had Instagram in 2025?", highlighted the dynamics of a hitherto unpublished archival material as a source of inspiration, artistic investigation and critical thinking. The empirical contact with the Archive of the Athens School of Fine Arts, and especially with the artist's personal documents such as letters, photographs and manuscripts, allowed us to approach not only the work but also the psyche and possible attitudes of Engonopoulos' life. Access to the archive allowed us to formulate documented speculations about the concerns that would concern him if he were alive today, the attitude he would maintain towards social media and the ways of expression he would choose. More specifically, it would not post any reels, and would choose the combination of image and text both systematically and consciously.
The research method was based on a multi-layered approach: combining speech and image, utilizing artificial intelligence, and creative representation within the framework of Instagram's capabilities. The structure of the account and the curation of the posts were not just an aesthetic choice, but a conscious act of cultural interpretation and paying homage to a creator who represents the Greek surrealism of an era with different characteristics in terms of the social interconnection of people. The use of artificial intelligence, in particular by creating a poem from ChatGPT that was presented as authentic, created an experiment of "critical readiness": it essentially raised the question of preserving the authenticity of artistic style, especially at a time when the fine lines between human creation and artificial intelligence are more blurred than ever.
The work contributed to the contemporary dialogue on the ethics and legal protection of intellectual creation, positioning the archive not as a static repository, but as a living tool for understanding and commenting on the present. The invocation of cultural heritage emerges as an essential ethical guideline, reinforcing the position of art and memory as foundations for confronting the new tools and challenges of the fourth industrial revolution. Through this approach, the work goes beyond the artistic experiment and is shaped as a contribution to the broader discussion about cultural identity and its management in the contemporary digital environment.
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