Article in the Newspaper "Il Secolo XIX"
June 1987, Genoa, Italy
By Mauro Bocci, Historian of Art

Analyzing Iannis Nikou's work, we witness, even in paintings of different periods, an identical concept of mystery, solitude and astonishment derived from "an other world".
The Greek artist's symbolic code does not coincide in all aspects with the typical symbolism of historical surrealism. Nikou's personal, so to say, code, is more expanded and his cultural constants are obviously older and more classical.
In fact, in Nikou's work we find the happy coexistance of classicism together with the surrealistic imagination, materialized through techniques of different origin; all this performed in drawing of high quality and exalted colour, which compose characteristic elements of the school of magic realism... Indeed, by the means of his classical cultural background, Nikou is recreating images of violent muscularity, Bacchanal energy and eroticism, transforming them into visions of crystalline beauty and serenity.
Therefore, taking into consideration the amazing variety of Nikou's subjects, and his particular compositions which are fully of symbolic correlation, we can compare him to an other Greek creator; Lucian, the ancient author who in his book "A true story" is describing a planet of dreams, where everyone could choose a dream corresponding with his own mentality and personality... As compared with this ancient merchant of dreams, Iannis Nikou is eventually suggesting a personal utopia, daring and universal; the creation - through his paintings - of dreams common for all of us, in the name of Art...