It was an aunt's that I first smelled the tubes of oil paint... I was very young and when I'd go to their home, since I couldn't reach the doorknob, I held a stone and used it to bang on the door. On the top floor there was the room with the easel and the oil paints. That's where my Aunt Virgina painted. That was in 1922 when the refuges from the Asia Minor disaster came to Arta as they did to the whole of Greece. I have vivid memories of the smell of burnt wood and my mother telling me stories about these people who lost relatives and friends, their fortunes... And so I also asked my mother to make me a little pouch which I hung around my neck when I slept and inside it there were some film frames and a few more images... my fortune. So if something happened i'd save them.

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