Angelos Kitsos
Encyclopedia
Angelos Kitsos was the president of Rizarios Foundation
Manthos and Georgios Rizaris
Manthos Rizaris and Georgios Rizaris were Greek benefactors, merchants and members of the organization Filiki Eteria.Rizari brothers were born in the village of Monodendri of Zagori region . They lost both parents at an early age. Manthos Rizaris, the elder brother, moved to Moscow, in order to...

 (Ριζάρειο Ίδρυμα).He was a Greek
Greeks
The Greeks, also known as the Hellenes , are a nation and ethnic group native to Greece, Cyprus and neighboring regions. They also form a significant diaspora, with Greek communities established around the world....

 from Monodendri, Zagori
Zagori
Zagori , is a region and a municipality in the Pindus mountains in Epirus, in northwestern Greece. The seat of the municipality is the village Asprangeloi. It has an area of some 1,000 square kilometres and contains 45 villages known as Zagoria , and is in the shape of an upturned equilateral...

. He was member of the Councils of the Foundation for the Restoration of Greeks from Albania (Ίδρυμα Αποκαταστάσεως Ομογενών εξ Αλβανίας,I.A.O.A.) and the Foundation of Research of the Ionian and Adriatic space. He was a towering figure for Zagori and the rest of Epirus
Epirus (region)
Epirus is a geographical and historical region in southeastern Europe, shared between Greece and Albania. It lies between the Pindus Mountains and the Ionian Sea, stretching from the Bay of Vlorë in the north to the Ambracian Gulf in the south...

 and Western Greece. Kitsos was a lawyer, but he also worked on script-writing for a number of documentaries, and wrote a number of books.

Early life

He was born in Corfu, Greece
Greece
Greece , officially the Hellenic Republic , and historically Hellas or the Republic of Greece in English, is a country in southeastern Europe....

. His father was Athanasios Kitsos and also was a lawyer. Angelos went to the historical Kaplaneios School
Kaplaneios School
The Kaplaneios School was a Greek educational institution that operated in Ioannina from 1797 to 1820/1. The school evolved into the most significant intellectual center of the city through the work of Athanasios Psalidas, a major representative of the modern Greek Enlightenment...

 for primary education till 1945, that he entered the (also historical for Ioannina
Ioannina
Ioannina , often called Jannena within Greece, is the largest city of Epirus, north-western Greece, with a population of 70,203 . It lies at an elevation of approximately 500 meters above sea level, on the western shore of lake Pamvotis . It is located within the Ioannina municipality, and is the...

) Zosimaia School
Zosimaia School
The Zosimaia School of Ioannina has been one of the most significant Greek middle-level educational institutions during the last period of Ottoman rule in the region...

. His classmate during primary and secondary, Christos Makris, says: "The entire class was depending on him![...] While we read "Thesaurus", "Romance" and the "Mask", he read Dostoevsky
Fyodor Dostoevsky
Fyodor Mikhaylovich Dostoyevsky was a Russian writer of novels, short stories and essays. He is best known for his novels Crime and Punishment, The Idiot and The Brothers Karamazov....

, Tolstoi
Leo Tolstoy
Lev Nikolayevich Tolstoy was a Russian writer who primarily wrote novels and short stories. Later in life, he also wrote plays and essays. His two most famous works, the novels War and Peace and Anna Karenina, are acknowledged as two of the greatest novels of all time and a pinnacle of realist...

, Hemingway
Ernest Hemingway
Ernest Miller Hemingway was an American author and journalist. His economic and understated style had a strong influence on 20th-century fiction, while his life of adventure and his public image influenced later generations. Hemingway produced most of his work between the mid-1920s and the...

, Rousseau
Jean-Jacques Rousseau
Jean-Jacques Rousseau was a Genevan philosopher, writer, and composer of 18th-century Romanticism. His political philosophy influenced the French Revolution as well as the overall development of modern political, sociological and educational thought.His novel Émile: or, On Education is a treatise...

, Voltaire
Voltaire
François-Marie Arouet , better known by the pen name Voltaire , was a French Enlightenment writer, historian and philosopher famous for his wit and for his advocacy of civil liberties, including freedom of religion, free trade and separation of church and state...

, Nitsche
Friedrich Nietzsche
Friedrich Wilhelm Nietzsche was a 19th-century German philosopher, poet, composer and classical philologist...

..." Angelos studied law, at the Law School of Athens.

Career

In 1960, he was employed in the National Foundation (Εθνικό Ίδρυμα), where in 1961 he was given responsibility of the Sector of Programme of Communal Development. In 1971, he was elected as lifelong member of the Council of the Rizarios Foundation. In 1974, he became Director of Cultural Programmes in the National Foundation. More specifically, in the National Foundation, he worked mainly on the programmes of local development of Thessaloniki
Thessaloniki
Thessaloniki , historically also known as Thessalonica, Salonika or Salonica, is the second-largest city in Greece and the capital of the region of Central Macedonia as well as the capital of the Decentralized Administration of Macedonia and Thrace...

, Chalcidice
Chalcidice
Chalkidiki, also Halkidiki, Chalcidice or Chalkidike , is a peninsula in northern Greece, and one of the regional units of Greece. It is part of the region of Central Macedonia. The autonomous Mount Athos region is part of the peninsula, but not of the regional unit...

 and Eurytania.

Co-operations for development

Kitsos co-operated with the American Agricultural School, the Bureau of Social Affairs of the United Nations, the EOEX, the CARE Organisation, the National Centre, the Greek Ministry of Internal Affairs, the Greek Ministry of Agriculture, the Greek Ministry of Education, the Centre of Constant Training of Public Servants. E.R.A. (Ελληνική Ραδιοφωνία), the state radio station, often consulted Angelos's large disc library, that already numbered over 9000 discs in the 70s.


In co-operation with the "Stavros S. Niarchos" foundation and the University of Athens, Angelos managed to build the Social Hospice, the International Centre of Culture and Tradition and the Unit of Natural Medicine. He also co-operated with the director group of Roberus Manthoulis, Photis Mesthenaios, Hercules Papadakis and as executive producer and script-writer produced, on the account of the National Foundation a number of films and documentaries. He also co-operated with Kostas Fronzos to build the 1st Student Hospice and with Froso Ioannidi to build the Pupil Hospice of Tsepelovo. In the Foundation for Restoration of Greeks from Albania, he built the Centre of Professional Training of Pogoniani, a move characterised by the Wall Street Journal as " major lesson of diplomacy in the Balkans".

Activities in the Rizarios Foundation

Angelos Kitsos has connected his name with all attempts of development of the wealth of Rizarios foundation in favor of Epirus. He was the main negotiator with the Karamanlis
Constantine Karamanlis
Konstantínos G. Karamanlís , commonly anglicised to Constantine Karamanlis or Caramanlis, was a four-time Prime Minister, the 3rd and 5th President of the Third Hellenic Republic and a towering figure of Greek politics whose political career spanned much of the latter half of the 20th century.-...

 government (1979) for the exchange of an area in Vassilisis Sofias Avenue in Athens, for the Ionian School, 17.000m2 in the Delta of Phalero and equal area in Ioannina, including the Agricultural Boarding School. Also, in co-operation with Stathi Lampridi, Yanni Sarali and Thanasi Liouma, he managed that 30% of the annual income of Rizarios Foundation went in favor of Zagori. As president of the foundation,Kitsos was the instigator of building the Rizarios Handcraft Centre, the Rizarios Exhibition Centre, the Open-Air Theatre and Sports Stadium of Monodendri, the first of which is to be named after him. In co-operation with the Latsis Group and the "Stavros S.Niarchos" foundation, Angelos Kitsos brought to Monodendri a number of rare exhibitions, some of which were opened by the President of the Hellenic Republic himself.

Films and Documentaries

The greatest power (Η πιο μεγάλη δύναμη) (1st award of short length movie, Thessaloniki Festival,1962)

The first step (Το πρώτο βήμα) (1st award of cinema critics for short length movie, Thessaloniki Festival,1963)

The agricultural housekeeping (Το αγροτικό νοικοκυριό)

Green gold (Πράσινο χρυσάφι)

Organisation and management of agricultural exploits (Οργάνωση και διαχείριση γεωργικών εκμεταλλεύσεων)

Books and publications

Programme of Tourist Development of Thessaloniki(NEKA, 1961)

Tourism and Social Development(EOT,1971)

Communication and Discussion

Meaning, significance and evolution of the educational cinema - The educational documentary in Greece

Popular training and Communal Development

The meaning of compromise in Communal Development and the peaceful resolution of issues

Programme of local development in post-war Greece

The Greek contribution in the new perspective of Albania

Exhibitions

Images of Greece 1903-1930 by Fred Boissonas

Russia 100 years

The villages of Zagori

Life of Zagorisians 1860-1960

Ioannina 1860-1960

Greece 1896-1906

Greece of the hard work 1900-1960, Collection of Nikos Politis

The Architecture of Central Zagori

A Greek Portfolio by Constantine Manos

Following the accidental by Willy Ronis

Further reading

"To Zagori mas",n.363, September 2008

Kathimerini: http://news.kathimerini.gr/4dcgi/_w_articles_civ_2_12/08/2008_280904, http://www.zosimaia.gr/MeNuDynamic.asp?menu=5&submenu=3&aID=31

Neoi Agones: loss for Epirus, the death of Angelos Kitsos
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