The Department of History and Archaeology of the National and Kapodistrian University of Athens (NKUA) expresses its deep sorrow regarding the loss of Associate Professor of Art History, Stelios Lydakis.

Born in Archanes, Crete, in 1933, the deceased studied Art History at the University of Cologne (1958–63), where he also completed his doctoral thesis on the subject of the Greek landscape in European painting (1963).

Upon returning to Greece, he worked at the Ephorate of Modern Monuments. As a fellow of the Alexander von Humboldt Foundation, he conducted research at the Universities of Cologne, Bonn, and Munich for his book regarding the history of 19th-century Greek painting (1972).

For years, he was a key collaborator of the "Melissa" publishing house, authoring, among other works, monographs on Greek painters of the 19th and 20th centuries (1974, 1975). He also authored the extensive, foundational volumes of the History of Modern Greek Painting and Engraving from the 16th to the 20th Century (1976), the Dictionary of Greek Painters and Engravers from the 16th to the 20th Century (1977), and the history, typology, and Dictionary of Greek Sculptors (1981, 2011). Furthermore, he wrote and translated books, and organized and accompanied travelers on cultural trips all over the world.

He also collaborated as an art critic for magazines and newspapers. He was elected to the rank of Assistant Professor in the Department in 1993, promoted to the rank of Associate Professor in 1997, and retired in 2000, having enriched the Department's Museum of Archaeology and History of Art with works of modern Greek art. Finally, he served as Director of the Museum of the City of Athens.