'Spagorammenos'.
Stamatis L. Polenakis was a pioneering Greek illustrator, cartoonist and animator. During World War II, he created the first Greek animated film, 'The Duce Narrates' (1945), which satirized the Italian dictator Benito Mussolini and his invasion of Greece. After the war, he became one of the first Greeks working in advertising animation. For the family weekly Romantso, he made his popular satirical comic features 'Pipis Papias' (1947-1952) and 'Spagorammenos' (1948-1970s).
Early life and career
Stamatis L. Polenakis (Σταμάτης Λ. Πολένακης) was born in 1908 in Athens, into a family that hailed from the island of Sifnos. While studying at the Athens School of Fine Arts, he published his first cartoons in the press. Starting at age 20, he specialized in satirical cartoons and caricatures, while also doing graphic design for advertisements for newspapers and magazines. Many of his cartoons satirized Adolf Hitler and Benito Mussolini imaginatively and with great humor.
Cartoon by Stamatis Polenakis, ridiculing Benito Mussolini.
The Duce Narrates
During the German-Italian occupation of Greece in World War II, Polenakis left Athens and settled on the island Sifnos. Closer to his relatives and nature, he felt he could live with more dignity than in the capital. It also offered him the opportunity to continue making his cartoons. Between 1942 and 1944, he worked in complete secrecy on several black-and-white sketches and watercolor cartoons that spoofed the 1940-1941 Greco-Italian War. Graphically, they were a combination of caricature, resistance humor and his academic knowledge of painting. Since the Italian conquerors could enter the houses of the Sifnians at any time, the cartoonist had to make sure he could not get caught. So he made "innocent" landscapes of the island on the reverse sides of the pieces of paper that carried his biting cartoons.
After the Liberation, Polenakis returned to Athens, where he teamed up with filmmakers Prodromos Meravidis and Thanasis Papadoukas to turn his black-and-white drawings into an animated film. The music was edited by composer Andreas Poggis, while the orchestra was conducted by Minas Portokalis. Released to the public in 1945, 'The Duce Narrates' ('O Ntoútse afigeítai') was the first animated film produced in Greece. The seven-minute "Mickey-Mouse-type" film, as the creator mentions in the credits, satirizes the Italian invasion of Greece on 28 October 1940 and especially "Il Duce" Mussolini, who narrates his exploits, but in reality constantly contradicts himself. The film was lost during the Greek Civil War (1946-1949) and it wasn't until 1980 before a negative was found and restored. It can nowadays be seen on YouTube.
'Pipis Papias'.
Comic artist
After World War II, Stamatis Polenakis became a prominent cartoonist, working for newspapers like Kathimerini, Apogeumatini and Ethnikós Kyryx. During the Civil War years, political cartooning was a dangerous activity, so many cartoonists turned to the light humor of family magazines. Polenakis became a contributor to the weekly Romantso, edited by Nikolaos Theofanidis. His first creation was the comic strip 'Pipis Papias' ("Pipis the Duck", 1947-1952), about a curly swindler. One of the first Greek comic heroes and comic strip series, some of the strips were collected in a 1978 book by publisher Columbra in its "Genuine Greek Comics" series.
The second comic character created by Stamatis Polenakis became his best-known, 'Spagorammenos' ("The Miser"). Starting publication in Trast tou Géliou ("Laughter Trust") magazine in 1948, the feature was later continued in Romtantso. During the 1950s and 1960s, it became extremely popular for the extreme whims of its character's stinginess. In 1971, 'Spagorammenos' was even adapted into a television series starring Stavros Xenidis.
Advertising animation
Together with Nikos V. Routsos, Stamatis Polenakis additionally founded an advertising company, which regularly worked with the French production house Studio Eclair. During the 1950s and 1960s, he designed and animated around 500 cinema commercials, making him one of the first Greeks to work professionally with animation.
Painter
In his sixties during the 1970s, Polenakis retired from print media and animation and turned to painting. During these retirement years, he held three individual exhibitions of his paintings, participated in many group exhibitions and was one of the founding members of the Hellenic Chamber of Arts. In 1979, he donated his entire collection of wartime watercolor cartoons to the War Museum Athens.
Inventor
Apart from being a talented cartoonist and animator, Stamatis Polenakis was also a crafty inventor. While living in Sifnos, he built a machine for semi-automatic water transport in the garden. He built mousetraps which did not trap the mice, but re-transported them outside the house. He additionally designed lifeboats that don't capsize and non-slip bathtubs.
Legacy
A national pioneer in several artistic fields, Stamatis L. Polenakis died in 1997. His son is writer and theater critic Leandros Polenakis, and his daughter the journalist Maria Polenaki. His grandson is the poet Stamtis Polenakis.
Stamatis L. Polenakis.