The inter-war period saw the widespread adoption of European trends that made Greek plastic artists more sensitive to their ambience. This sensitivity was expressed through the 'discovery' of the Greek environment and Greek history. Beginning with Konstantinos Parthenis, who is said to have turned the experience of light into a spiritual event, one can move on to Konstantinos Maleas, in whose paintings the 'familiar' Greek landscape was rendered with a unique visual awareness. The latter's work was associated with that of Spyros Papaloukas, who discovered the richness of Byzantine art and gave a new solidity to masses and forms. In his turn, Photis Kontoglou came into contact with Western art but turned his back on it, and instead reflected in his work both the popular monastic spirit of the Byzantine tradition and the legacy of Eastern mythmaking. Even Bouzianis, who was influenced by Expressionism, used warm colours with a greater intensity during his stay in Greece, distributing light in such a way that it did not detach forms from their environment. Nikos Chatzikyriakos-Ghikas, inspired by the Cubist movement, read the spiritual essence of Greek space in the language of geometry. Finally, with the inventiveness of his subjects, the Surrealist Nikos Engonopoulos seemed to be drawing on different periods in Greek history, and through his calm backgrounds and the modelling of his forms he brought the best out of certain aspects of Byzantine painting.