Dimitri Soulas’ family hails from Souli. The first written record of the name Soulos is from 1788 and appears in a letter from the Souliotes to the Syndikusses in Preveza.

1750-1803

Dimitri Soulas’ great-great-grandfather was the so-called “Kapitanios” (leader) Yiannis Soulos, who was born in 1750 in Souli and died in 1808 in Corfu.
Souli had been founded around 1600 when many Christians fled the Turkish enforced Islamization and settled in the Kassiopia mountains (a region in Epirus, 100 km southeast of Ioannina), where they founded the village Souli. After more Christians fleeing persecution by the Turks arrived, three more villages were founded – a so-called “Tetrachori” (four-village-complex), consisting of the villages Souli, Samoniva, Kiafa and Avarikos. Those four villages and seven others formed the “Souliotic Confederation”. With a population of 6,000 (2,000 of whom were warriors), the confederation remained free from outside governance from its founding in 1600 until 1803, when the citizens eventually left.
“Kapitanios” Yiannis Soulos’ son was Mitsos (Dimitrios) Soulos. He was born in 1775 in Souli, was part of the Greek revolution and fought against Ali Pasha in Souli. He died trying to escape the besieged Messolonghi in 1826.
Yiannis Soulos, born in Souli in 1794 was Mitsos Soulos’ son. He died 1855 in Nafpaktos. (Greek Orthodox Christians name their children after the grandparents)

1803-1854

In December 1803, the Souliotes were forced to surrender and leave their home Souli after withstanding a four year siege by Ali Pasha (1799-1803). At first, they settled in Parga before moving on to Corfu later. Among the items the family Soulas were able to salvage when they had to leave Souli, was a manuscript with three Holy Masses from the 16th century. In it, all wars, as well as important Soulas’ family dates (births, deaths etc.), had also been recorded.
From Corfu, the Souliotes relocated to Central Greece where they played an important role in the Greek Revolution in 1821, which freed Greece from Turkish supremacy. After the Souliotes freed Nafpaktos in 1828, many Souliotes families relocated there, Yiannis Soulos’ family among them.
In 1835, Nasios-Lazaros Soulos, son of Yiannis Soulos, was born in Nafpaktos. In 1853, he fought as a mercenary in the Macedonian movement funded by King Otto during the Crimean War.
The French and the British being concerned about an increase of Russian power at that time, took control of the Piraeus harbor and declared that they would conquer Athens unless King Otto stopped funding the Movement. As King Otto could no longer support the Souliotes mercenaries they settled in nearby Pravi (today’s Eleftheroupoli) producing and manufacturing the tobacco for which the region was famous.

1854-1937

Dimitrios Soulos, born in Pravi in 1860, was the firstborn son of Nasios-Lazaros Soulos. Dimitrios Soulos (Dimitri Soulas’ grandfather) also worked in tobacco production. When Macedonia was freed from Turkish governance in 1912, he first became a tobacco broker and then a tobacco salesman. He settled in Kavala changed his surname to Soulas to conform to the Modern Greek grammar. After moving to Thessaloniki in 1930, he built a tobacco factory and a high rise.
Athanassios Soulos, born in 1905, was Dimitrios Soulas’ last child. He was the photographer’s father and also worked as a tobacco broker and salesman.

1938-1959

Dimitrios Soulas was born to Athanassios Soulas and his wife Xeni Agallidou in 1938. He grew up in a traditional middle-class family.
In his youth he was an avid reader as well as writing verse, poetry and novels. In 1955, his script “Good-bye Happiness” for the first Greek photographic novel staged by Alkis Steas, won first place in a contest organized by the newspaper “DRASIS”. The novel was then published in several installments.
He attended the second all-boys high school in Thessaloniki and following his graduation enlisted in the Greek air force to complete his obligatory military service. In the army, he hosted radio shows and wrote verse for his division. He was discharged in 1958. In the same year, he discovered his Souliotes ancestors’ manuscript with the Holy Masses and the records in the basement of the family-owned high-rise. This led him to research his family history.
After his military service, he wanted to study stage direction but instead decided to first fulfill his father’s greatest wish to continue the family tradition in the tobacco business. Despite trying, he was very unhappy in his job, so he offered his father a compromise: study stage direction or advertising. In turn, his father offered to send him to Germany to study medicine or engineering. Dimitris Soulas accepted the offer and learned German at the Goethe Institute in Luneburg for six months.
When he visited the photo exhibition The Family of Man in Hamburg in 1959, he was deeply impressed and convinced that photography was the only true medium of expression.

1960

He enrolled in dentistry at the Frankfurt University in 1960 but failed to complete his first semester.

1960-1965

He studied applied economics at the Johann-Wolfgang-Goethe University in Frankfurt. He did his doctorate on “Marketing and the Consumer Society” at the Department of Social Research in Frankfurt, where Horkheimer, Sweezy and others lectured at that time, and familiarized himself with Adorno’s theories, Feuerbach’s materialism and Hegel’s dialectic.
In 1965, an international American fruit and vegetable corporation with a subsidiary in Munich hired him. In the same city, he married Susanna Haun: the couple separated in 1973. The same year Dimitri Soulas decided to give up smoking and with his “no smoking” money bought his first Exakta Spiegelreflex camera. His theoretical knowledge in photography was already advanced.

1966

His son Oliver was born in October 1966.

1967

Immediately after the military coup in Greece in April 1967, Dimitri Soulas and other Greeks in Munich founded the “Pan-Hellenic Anti-dictatorial Union” whose purpose was to use democratic means in the “struggle” against the dictatorship. In the following month, the Greek consul to Munich (who was also a representative for the military junta) revoked Dimitri Soulas’ passport. He was then forced to apply for a certificate of identity, the so-called Fremdenpass, with the German police.
In October 1967, the commercial attaché and junta colonel at the Greek embassy demanded that Soulas’ employer fire him because of his “persona non grata” status. Had the company not complied, it would have been excluded from importing fruit from Greece.

1968-1969

In February 1968, Soulas’ employer demanded he resign from the Anti- dictatorial Union, but Soulas refused and was fired. He used his severance pay to buy photographic equipment.
In March 1968, he started working as a freelance photo reporter. He took his camera and walked the streets of Munich, taking pictures of people in unusual situations. From the very beginning he was able to sell his photos to various newspapers. The picture editor of the Associated Press, Klaus Hampel, was deeply impressed by Soulas’ photos and offered him a freelance position.
This cooperation with one of the world’s biggest news agencies was a very positive development in Soulas’ career – he received orders on current topics every day. He delivered his photos to papers that were paying members of the agency via radiotelegraphy (precursor of today’s fax machines – a rotating cylinder drew in the photo and “read” its light and dark parts, then used radio waves to transmit it.) Each photo also had a short description of the subject as well as information on place, date and author/photographer.
In 1968, Soulas was briefed at the Associated Press offices every morning. On his return, he would develop the photos, magnify them and transmit them via the AP-network. In addition to his work for the Associated Press, he also received orders from leading magazines such as Stern, Quick or Neue Revue, allowing him to also take photos related to more timeless topics.

1970-1972

In autumn 1970, Leo Fritz Gruber, founder and director of the Photokina exhibitions, invited Soulas to appear at a congress in Cologne, where he presented the young photographer and called him the “photographer of the deciding moment”, who had followed Henri Cartier-Bresson’s example. It was during this congress that Soulas met Cartier-Bresson, who offered to send his photos to the agency Magnum. It wasn’t long before, Soulas cooperated with that agency, too.

1974

After the dictatorship was overthrown, Soulas decided to return to Greece for good. However, he soon realized that photojournalism in Greece was not at the same level as it had been in Germany – photojournalists had to take pictures of parades, weddings and christenings in addition to their journalistic work in order to make a living.

1975-1983

Until 1976, Dimitri Soulas commuted between Germany and Greece. He decided to investigate becoming a trader or entrepreneur.
In 1977, he learned that the Otto Maier Verlag (a publishing house and developer of the Ravensburger family games) was looking for a partner in Greece. Soulas did some research and found out that there was a demand for learning games in Greece, so he founded the import company Das gute Spielzeug AG (English: The Good Toy Corporation). His aim was to import learning and social games with properly translated instruction manuals to Greece and sell them there.

1980

Discovery of the history of Souli, gave rise to the idea of founding an association that would unite all Souliotes throughout Greece.

1983

Marries Vassiliki Karagianni in July (divorces in 2001).

1984

His daughter Iphigeneia is born in November.

1990
Electronic games take over the Greek market and become a major part of the Ravensburger learning games portfolio. In order to avoid the steep customs tariffs and stay competitive, Soulas started producing the Ravensburger learning games in Greece. He did not manage to recover the market share.

1991

Dissolving of his toy companies. Starts working as a marketing advisor for the German direct marketing companies PVS and Schober Information Group, representing them in Greece.

1998

After establishing various contacts for many years, he founds a world wide association for Souliotes and is elected president during the first board meeting.

2001

The association organizes the first Pan-Hellenic meeting of the Souliotes in Souli. More than 4,000 Souliotes from all parts of Greece participated, including President K. Stefanopoulos, the President of Parliament. Several secretaries and congressional representatives also attended.

2003

He meets his German partner, Alexa Schlüter, in Munich.

2004

No longer a photographer and 35 years later, the head of the Munich Photo Museum, Dr. Ulrich Pohlmann, expressed an interest in Soulas’ works and requested some copies for the museum’s collection. Soulas donated his complete archive (10,000 black-and-white-negatives) to the Photo Museum to show his strong connection to the city where his career as a photographer had begun.

2005

Dimitris Soulas is elected honorary chairman of the worldwide Souliotes association.

2006

On the occasion of the city of Munich’s 850th anniversary in 2008 and Soulas’ 70th birthday, the Photo Museum Munich and the Photo Museum Thessaloniki organize a traveling exhibition and other venues are scheduled.
Today, Dimitri Soulas is working on documentary films and lives together with his life-partner Alexa Schlüter in Thessaloniki, Greece and Garmisch –Partenkirchen.