Still life, 1899

After his first lessons at the Art and Craft Industry School of Corfu, Skarvellis continued his studies in Trieste and Rome. On his return to Corfu, he worked with other artists on the decoration of the Achilleion, where the Italian influences which are a mark of his art are apparent, while for a short while he lived in Egypt. Basically a landscape painter, he specialised in water-colours and, like Angelos Giallinas and Vikentios Bokatsiambis, produced works of a high standard of colour sensibility, and succeeded in the course of his career in going beyond the Italian academic influence and in following more the achievements of Impressionism. The works in the Averoff Gallery show these characteristics very obviously.