Kind Words

Dear Mr. Rivellis,

My deepest and warmest gratitude is owed to the fact that you do not forget me, honoring me so generously. It is a pity, however, that truth—its deepest and most profoundly complex essence—cannot be photographed, especially when it comes to my gratitude. The rest of my thanks, which are not lacking in enthusiasm, are perhaps the most essential: these photographs affect me as much as paintings do, perhaps even more satisfyingly, as they effortlessly uncover the value of detail without distancing it from its reality, but rather ennobling it.

I love shadows generally—and therefore, I am moved by the shadows that photographs cast upon their subjects, as if on astonished ground. Shadows, that ultimately melancholic remainder of us.

And, of course, what a wealth of subjects! With a single glance, one traverses humanity and its symptoms worthy of preservation, as if they were imperishable. For these things and for all that I omit, I thank you imperishably…

With love,

K. Dimoula

Dear Mr. Rivellis,

You follow the model of the ancient philosophers, with free disciples and without organizing a school as an institution—an open workshop where diplomas are nothing more than the works of those who love, desire, and persist in pursuing what lies “beyond” the art of photography.

You have devoted your life to this art and persist in it, despite the deluge of electronic and other related means that offer easy and instantaneous imagery.

I marveled at the multitude of the “faithful,” and I counted beyond a hundred.

I marveled at the activity not only of the twenty-six years of Kyklos, but, as far as I know you, exceeding three decades.

I marveled at the number of creators and the variety of directions.

I marveled even more at the black-and-white.

I marveled at the volume and weight of the tome!

Praise for this achievement.

Kyklos has a future, and you stand firm in your faith.

P. Tetsis

Mr. Plato,

You are awesome - I love you and I am grateful to have met you! (even though I was absent from the assembly—this has nothing to do with it)

I feel you and I hear you.

Mega respect! *

I’ll see you soon***

ΠOur discussions in the lessons are always thought-provoking and thus immensely enjoyable. Everything you say, I believe, will be understood by everyone in the Circle in their own time and in their own way, but they will certainly not go to waste. The more confident we are about the execution of our photos, the harder it is to accept rejection. It is so human and we all experience it, and you are absolutely right when you say that we are all in the same boat.

This daily exposure and the throwing out of "oneself," besides improving us artistically, is also tremendous psychotherapy, you should charge double for it. However, overcoming our wounded ego, if we manage it, will be the greatest gift you have given us as humans. And it is amazing how much we all trust your artistic judgment, which is so precise that it has become like an instinct, almost like a psychological profile.

Anyone else rejecting our photos would make us skeptical, even if it were ourselves. I find all this very exciting and I think it would be good for everyone in the class, though not democratic, to be obliged to send 25 consecutive numbered photos daily as you did with yours. This would force us to be more serious and more humble in our art and perhaps discover that we often choose the wrong shots. I want to say that this seminar is indeed very important and I am very glad to be attending it.

I express my thanks now because I am overjoyed to know that you understand what I mean and I must express it, even in writing.

Goodnight

I consider myself very lucky to have you as a teacher and I wanted to tell you that the most valuable lesson I have taken over the years is that I finally do not need to take myself and the world too seriously to be able to discern the significance and beauty of things. The mystery is everywhere as long as you have the innocence and wisdom to see it, and photography can sometimes give it to us so simply and powerfully that it is like a small miracle.

One of the main reasons I am glad to be alive and thrilled is a few moments of joy, satisfaction from a transformation of reality that all this is due to art.

I felt very sure about the seminar that it would make me feel wonderful. Knowing nothing else except the destination, I felt peace and happiness, all that I feel now with what I have already lived I feel more intensely.

Looking for you, I felt that something was missing from the puzzle of my life, on the journey, although alone, I felt that I had company. My company was the love I had and the choice to express all that I have hidden inside me for a long time. One of the missing pieces is naturally you, but that's okay now because I have already met you.

Great joy to have met you. I am very happy about what I learned because I could not have learned it in any other way. My desire to take a few bad or good photos has become a reality. Now that I write to you I feel a bittersweet emotion, it is logical, because how can we do it, everything eventually ends.

I will miss all this, I need to get used to it, I know, it will be a little difficult for me. But I am glad that I dared because in the end I won, what more precious than art, it feeds you with joy and with anxiety for something better.

I had sucked all the creation from within me, I was looking for something, but nowhere nothing. My heart had emptied, the fairy tale had ended, but now the story began again. Knowing you, I felt that I was in a community where others are also fighting for something I am looking for, to see the magic of the image. With you, my teacher, I would like to create whatever is most beautiful and magical.

With love

Dear Mr. Rivellis,

These days I finished the book "Introduction to Artistic Photography".

During these days, I felt that I was moving to another level. As if I had taken a "substance" that opened another center. Since then something has changed.

My photographic perception has increased. My spiritual horizons have expanded so much that I feel insignificant in front of these photos that truly captivated me and at the same time an impatience, making me search in every photograph for that "subject" that will automatically transform in my eyes!

Good Morning Teacher,

I just finished "Alexis" by Yourcenar.

I feel that I owe you a big thank you, now that the vibrations from the book are still strongly affecting me. Later, in the routine of the day, I might neglect it.

Thank you for Yourcenar, for Bach, for the Legend of Saint Pot. For everything!

I came to your amphitheater two years ago thinking I would learn photography. I'm starting to learn about myself. And I discover that maybe I am not a photographer. And it does not bother me.

I have found myself watching the discussions of a huge intellectual circle: Dostoevsky, Nietzsche, Papadiamantis, Rivellis. And in this company, you can't speak recklessly. You told us when you described your meeting with Yourcenar. I feel it every time I go to click.

But it is wonderful to listen. I fully understand now what you told us in the amphitheater: "We will never be Kertész, but how wonderful that he exists".

There is also T.S. Eliot in the preface to "Thoughts on Photography" that reassures us.

Thank you!

I found myself randomly at a gathering at photovision, where we were discussing photography etc. At some point, someone claimed that the only one in Greece who knows about photography is Rivellis. "I will talk to you about Rivellis," someone interrupted. "I was young and working at --------," he said. "So, I had placed an ad to sell the Leica I had. But then I randomly met Rivellis on the street, who advised me—without knowing me—to keep it and go work abroad. I was stunned, thought it over, and followed his advice. Thanks to him, I continued and achieved what I achieved," he said.

"And one more thing," he continued, "when Koudelka came to see his exhibition, he had to wait quite a bit outside until he could see me! That shows respect, no matter that I was unknown then, nothing in front of Koudelka. It's a pity," he concluded, "that he is not involved in things, while all the ignorant and selfish people have taken the chairs."

I sincerely want to thank you for what you gave us over the weekend. I got more than I expected.

Even in the points where I disagreed with your view, the way you approach issues is subversive and that, beyond being charming and exciting, is the essential quest.

Because what I feel is missing, I think not only for me, is a different view of the world and the way we operate. We need to see many things differently, perhaps from the beginning. Your approach is outside the "current" logic of things, and that is as invaluable as it is rare.

In a nutshell, to not tire you, I hope you continue doing what you do in the way you do it.

I feel the need to congratulate you on how you conveyed what you wanted to your audience. You are a gifted teacher and it is certain that neither talent nor communicability alone would have sufficed for what we experienced.

I admired how you organized your archive and the speed with which you found a specific photo to answer a question.

The deep knowledge you have of your subject would not have been enough for the marvelous result if you did not have a broader culture.

All these concentrated in you made me not at all bothered by the absolute and decisive stance you sometimes have on what you believe.

I wish you always have this vitality and love for what you do and continue with the same appetite for many, many years.

Dear Mr. Rivellis,

I have sent you various emails where I spasmodically try to tell you things that concern me. Previously influenced by various sources, I considered you dogmatic and absolute. One Thursday, my friendship with one of your students brought me to the amphitheater in Piraeus. It was a critique day.

“No, no, yes, no, no, no, cut the crap, no, yes......”

You continued the critique. I was speechless. Finally, a teacher who behaves like a parent. Tough where the student needs to stay on track. At the same time, a sweet person.

I am the one who, if you remember, called you in June to enroll and make a deposit and you calmly replied that there was no need to rush. “We have time”.

Since then, of course, huge changes have happened within me. To not drag this out too much, today I stopped at the traffic light where I have been stopping for 10 years going to work. Next to the window was a bush from those that have the belts and it was full of small yellow flowers. My eyes teared up! In the morning when I woke up, I grabbed my partner's hand and my head was burning because I was somehow begging to go back to being 20. Now I know what I would do. Studies, travels, Bach, Wenders, Mizoguchi, Rivellis. Those would be my pursuits.

I would do it now too. But I would have enjoyed it differently now if I had started then.

I apologize for my verbosity but I feel you as a teacher and I want to say it.

I am overwhelmed by wants and shoulds. I have a huge thirst.

Thank you just for reading this.

I imagine that my thought is taken for granted and a realization of your own. I think that one reason for "producing" enemies is that you "discomfort" people... it's like a stone disturbing their calm waters, and depending on the "breadth" of the recipient, either the ripple is absorbed and as it spreads out it gains a musicality, or due to narrowness, it returns and reproduces the intensity. It is difficult to discomfort people when they are not ready for it. And finally: I think you earn your bread honestly, although what you offer is not appraised in money. Be well!!!

Thank you sincerely for the problems you have posed for me... The good thing is that I grew by an inch. However, the bad is that my field of vision has now surpassed the height of the wall where my security, complacency, and arrogance nested. Now, seeing beyond this height, I feel smaller and frightened. But I am even more afraid because I always had a suspicion of what happens beyond my own wall. I fear what you described about the confession (promise and inward rejection).

You are truly a great Teacher...

Dear Mr. Rivellis,

Although I have been following your work from a long time ago (since the days of the Panteion University classes), I never had the opportunity to participate in your seminars for various reasons (apart from attending some lectures).

However, all these years I have been a consistent student of your books, which—rightly or wrongly—make me feel an invisible familiarity, like a flickering scent. It resembles the familiarity we have with teachers and writers or photographers we loved from afar (and sometimes with some women...).

Within this "acquaintance" of ours, I took the courage (convinced that you wouldn't translate it to "audacity") to show you some of the (digital) photographs I have taken over the last decade.

Why did I choose you? Firstly because I consider you my teacher—as I described above. Secondly, I am now at an age where I feel the need to share them (well, and I thought to start from the top...)

And finally, I have always liked the "anti-establishment" daring of your critique... And I'll stop here. Good luck with your journey.

Thank you for striving to sharpen (firstly our thoughts and then) our vision.

PS: I hope you don't take this as "sycophancy", but through your book, I felt that you are what I call a "beautiful person". Restless, pleasant, creative, direct, open-minded, honest. This was a fairly significant reason for me to read it (not that the content is any less important)!

I wanted to say a big thank you for all that you have offered me as a teacher.

Obviously, for some people, you know that you have influenced their entire life. For others, like me, you have had a great impact - maybe the same - but you just don't know it, and that's why I'm writing it to you now.

The seminar of -------- was so important to me, that I feel it changed my life. It gave me tools that follow me to this day and allow me to distinguish the wheat from the chaff, not only in the art of photography but generally in art.

I am able to enjoy without guilt, e.g., when I do not know the current that a work of art represents and to know that if I "communicate" with it, that is enough.

Both I and my best friend often refer to you, both in our discussions and in discussions with others, to the point of being considered picturesque by our friends many times. But we do it because we feel that we have received solid knowledge, that you revealed the truth to us (which over time is confirmed by various things that "fit" into what we had heard from you).

Apart from me and my friend, there are others in our area who pronounce the name "Rivellis" with some awe, who are none other than my students ----------------------- who participate in the program--------------- --- Obviously, my decision to do this program had to do with my effort to transmit to my students what I learned from you and obviously I made continuous references to your name, so my students consider you something like a sacred totem, something distant that is very high, something like the wise Buddha, I would say if I wanted to joke.

So maybe I'm not a member of the Circle, but having studied all your books and seen all the videos (from older ones on ERT to the recent short ones), I think I have a good contact with your teaching, enough anyway to get material, which I then try to pass on to my students (to whom I explain from the beginning, that what they will learn in the artistic part of the program are those that I learned from you.

One of the little things I regret in my life is that when you asked us for photos in 1993/1994 to put them in the Monologue, I didn't give you any, as I told you -and you possibly remember- I was shy.

I wrote all this to you because if I didn't, I knew that the moment would come when I would regret it again. As a teacher, I know well how a teacher feels when he receives a good word from a former student. So, I wanted to send you the good word, because I felt it as my duty, a duty to my teacher whom I so much respect.

And since I said it all, let me also say one more thank you, because thanks to you I met Proust, something that has offered me countless, small moments of happiness and great enjoyment over the years.

Your book moved me, and I cried while reading it. How lucky I am to have met you and to have spent such wonderful moments in Syros and on our beautiful trips! And how nice that you had photos in the book that I was in front of when you took them. You have the gift to understand, to get to the essence of art, and to capture the crucial, and you can convey it in the language of the ordinary person. It saddens me that most people are comparatively disabled. It is difficult for us to think, let alone to speak. In an ideal world, the average person, not the great creator, should be like you. But they are not.

From the first moment I heard you speak at the presentation at the Benaki Museum about my then-favorite Antonioni and Cassavetes, I felt an incredible freshness that I seemed to have been waiting for a lifetime: A person who talks about beautiful and important things like a normal person. Not like an intellectual, not like a leftist, not with an attitude, but with emotion because what he talks about is his life.

I wanted to write these thoughts to you and tell you how important you and the Syros circle are to me!

With love

Teacher,

After your letter, I feel less alone... Thank you.

Thank you very much, Mr. Rivellis, for the three days of true communication and cultivation you offered us. Thank you also because with the absolute certainty you have to support values that are no longer recognized by most, you helped us take a breath from the terrible oppression of the Art Experts around the World.

I feel lucky that after Nikos Kazantzakis, I got my hands on your books, such as "Monologue on Photography", "Thoughts on Photography", "Introduction to Artistic Photography". I have read the first and the third twice and am going for the third.

I am 17 years old and live in Keratsini. I have been involved in artistic photography for about the last four years. I believe that art plays a significant role in my life, and the art of photography has become one of my main means of expression. When I started to really understand the meaning of artistic photography, perhaps involuntarily, I was looking for a central theory that I could follow - not uncritically and blindly, like a dogma, but one that fits my general view of the arts. And then it was when I read one of your books! There was an old edition from the '80s in my aunt's house library. Platon Rivellis - "Photography". Through the pages of the book, I learned a lot about the place of photography in the arts and society, and I loved it much more. I learned about the technical details, but I also explored visual angles (specifically yours) regarding the relationship of photographer-photography and photographer-society. I also met the greatness (!) of Bresson.

Lately, when the "52 Monologues" began to be published on your channel on YouTube, I was particularly happy. I had already (as you can imagine) built an image in my mind regarding your appearance, your "aura", and your temperament and I find that it was probably accurate. I say this because I believe that through these videos you allow the viewer to know you a bit more and, possibly, to familiarize themselves with you. As much as the artist/viewer can know the artist/inspirer. And, perhaps even more importantly, the student the teacher. For this reason, I need to consider you, through your theoretical and artistic work, my teacher. Even though you do not know me. Along with the great poets, painters, musicians in eternity.

Thank you very much for what you have personally offered me - and I imagine countless others. It is invaluable. You have my utmost respect and admiration.

I cannot express how lucky we are to have you so substantially in our lives. I was a fanatic fan from the first moment and continue with the same joy and need for all these things that concern me existentially and personally. ----------- How important you are in our lives and how you say the most important things in the simplest way.

Yesterday, when ----------------------- from the ------------------- was at his grandmother's house, she sat down to listen to you but did not get up from the chair until the end. ------------ wrote to me what his grandmother said:

"Grandma said exactly: He's amazing! You hang on his every word! And he's still here and watching! Just telling you that"

Mr. Rivellis,

I am sending you this email to tell you how deeply I enjoyed yesterday's lesson. Having studied Art Theory and Archaeology and having been in several different art spaces either participating more actively or as an observer, I have often existentially wondered about what art is and what I want my own position and relationship with it to be, always ending up with a more classic view of it at the risk of being characterized by the broader contemporary, "postmodern" and migratory art space as conservative or - at least - anachronistic. Without most realizing that this position is a conscious choice of substance.

Although my closest friendly circle shares these views with me, your lesson confirms and validates once again, in a deep and substantive way, that I have taken the right path. Which turns out to be also the first path that I had instinctively chosen at the beginning. Something that, as you said yesterday, is not limited to our view of art, but also extends and weaves all aspects of our lives as it is deeply incorporated within us.

For this very reason, your lesson, especially yesterday's, was so important to me. Like those times when you pick up a book and the author has the words to express exactly what you feel and believe, with a particularly relieving and optimistic complicity.

I am a pleasantly "surprised" admirer of your work (it's not a small thing to watch your show late at night on the internet and the next day at my workplace to receive books "on behalf of Mr. Platon Rivellis")!!! Of course, all this happened thanks to my beloved friend --------- who cares a lot about me and loves me.

I wanted you to know that your book "Introduction to Artistic Photography" has been constantly with me for the past two days. It’s beside me on the nightstand when I sleep, in the passenger seat, at my office, and even while taking my little daughter to ballet—I hold it in my hands, along with bags, jackets, and keys. I want you to know that I steal time wherever I can and read paragraphs "on the sly." Your book and I are in a period of "illicit flirting"! I've already read the introduction, and the immediacy with which you write, your humor, and your passion for the art of photography have given me immense satisfaction and joy. I was thrilled about the theory of "poverty" and the hardship—I dare add (you of course know what it means to have one eye perpetually shut, to drag yourself on the ground, to stoop, and then to hardly be able to walk—all for what? To achieve what we imagine)! Besides, there is great happiness in poverty... it reminded me of arte povera, cucina povera. Isn’t pleasure often hidden in simplicity and unpretentiousness?

With all this, I want to say that photography might also be somewhat therapeutic for me... Now your book as well!

Thank you for that!

Yesterday, I went to a photo presentation by the photographer Bruce Gilden in Athens. I just wanted to thank you from the bottom of my heart for how right you’ve been about what you've told us over the years and how once again I felt affirmed by you. How ridiculous he was, and what a silly American, sitting there analyzing each of his photographs. How exhausting someone can become. Imagine, he analyzed each photograph so much that even if it was interesting, suddenly it wasn't.

And I said to -------------- sitting next to me, "Ah! Riwéllis, you were so right." I have never met another teacher like you with the quality you have. And in London, where I took classes, everyone was mundane, lacking substance, only talking about technical stuff.

Thank you for existing!!!!

Hello !! I bought one of your books, "Introduction to Artistic Photography." I’m still on the first pages, and it's amazing. It has really excited me. I like how it connects all the art.

At the same time, I had also bought another book -------------, "Introduction to Photography." As I read it, it started to annoy me a lot. Full of terminologies and science and no substance. I will throw it away.

Luckily, I found your book because it is essential. From the first pages, I understand a lot.

I want you to know and thank you immensely for how much you've influenced me by transmitting your love for photography and teaching me how to see. Your lessons were like a revelation to me! An initiation into a magical world and something that holds a very important place in my life!

I was very lucky to have you as a teacher. I feel incredible joy both when I photograph and when I see photographic works that I like, and when I create something that I like. Maybe in recent years, I haven’t photographed or been involved as much as I would have liked because there were other priorities, but I never gave it up. Maybe this year will be the year that I get more actively back into photographic events.

I just finished your book "Introduction to Artistic Photography" and felt the need to write to you.

From the day I started reading your book, all the enthusiasm I had until that moment for photography slipped through me. Now I want to learn, to see, to be taught, and my sadness is even greater because I don't know how.

You opened the window, and now all the beauty I saw torments my soul. For this, I owe you a big thank you.

With appreciation,