Pavlos Samios was born in Athens in 1948.

He started drawing and painting at a very young age, helping his shoemaker father in his workshop.

Religious painting captivated him early on, and he worked at Dionysios Karoussos’s icon-painting studio until he was 18. At the same time, he took drawing lessons at Panos Sarafianos’s studio and was admitted to the Athens School of Fine Arts.

He was taught drawing by Nikos Nikolaou and painting by Yannis Moralis. A great teacher of his was also the painter Yannis Tsarouchis, whom he met in Paris in the 1970s. During that time, he was a member of the group of artists and intellectuals who frequented the “Magic Flute” restaurant in Athens. There he met the great composer Manos Hadjidakis, a master of the word and privy to the needs of young people, who encouraged him to think freely.

From 1978 to 1992 he lived and worked in Paris.

In 2000 he was elected professor at the Athens School of Fine Arts (Traditional Painting Workshop: Fresco – Byzantine icons – Manuscripts). He has painted many chapels using the fresco technique.

He has shown his work in 70 solo exhibitions and has participated in major group exhibitions in Greece and abroad.

He is married to Maria Xanthakos. He has two daughters from his first marriage, Pandora and Aphaea, who live in Paris.