Greek Painting of the 19th and 20th centuries has followed a path according to the country's more general political orientation since the formation of the Greek State in the early 1830's. In a sense, what has happened in Greece is characteristic of all small European countries of the periphery (Portugal, Bulgaria or Denmark). The impact of Munich or Paris as artistic centres has determined to a large extent the Greek artistic scene. Modern Greek artists have been working on the one hand with the burden of the heritage of Antiquity on their shoulders and, on the other, with the ambition to follow the example of the major European masters of the 19th & 20th centuries.