Athens

2021 in numbers

Local and overseas visitors

Greece 67%

Overseas 33%

Visitor from top 10 countries

France 27,7%

Germany 19,6% United Kingdom 13,4% Switzerland 11,6% Belgium 5,4% Cyprus 5,4% USA 5,3%

Netherlands 4,5% Israel 4,4%

Age range of visitors

Under 25s 14,9%

25 to 34 23,8%

35 to 44 20,1%

45 to 54 20,3%

55 to 64 13,2%

65+ 7,7%

Whom they visited the Museum with

With friends 29%

With their partner 27,8% Family 22,3% Alone 20%

Within the 1% framework of an organised visit

Permanent Collection

After an almost seven-month suspension of operations due to the pandemic, the Museum in Athens welcomed its visitors once again on 14.5.2021 with a renewed presentation of its permanent Collection and the exhibition, for the first time in Athens, of 58 works which bear witness, alongside the other works exhibited in the Museum, to the initiated perception and eclectic aesthetic with which Basil and Elise Goulandris composed their collection. Specifically, the second floor, dedicated to “Gazes of the 19th and 20th century” and to works on paper, was improved in order to highlight the particular relationship Basil and Elise Goulandris maintained with the artists themselves, emphasise the diversity of materials and techniques included in the Foundation’s Collection but also the significant contribution of women to the artistic developments of the previous century. The third and fourth floors, which house modern and contemporary Greek art, were also renewed; the third floor highlighting the exploration of representation and the human form through the particular gaze of some of the most important Greek painters, and the fourth the avant-garde researchers and poets of abstraction who often transcended the borders of Greece.

Temporary exhibitions

Andrew Levitas Let truth be the prejudice Sculpture installation on occasion of the film Minamata 21.10.2021-28.11.2021

“And each time I pressed the shutter release it was a shouted condemnation hurled with the hope that the pictures might survive through the years, that they might echo through the minds of men in the future, causing them caution and remembrance and realization“

(W. Eugene Smith)

In the autumn of 2021, the Museum in Athens hosted the Minamata project by multifaceted artist and film director Andrew Levitas. Levitas’ path crossed with that of top photo reporter W. Eugene Smith on the occasion of the 2020 screening of the film Minamata which brought to the surface Smith’s attempt to record and highlight, via his perceptive photographic gaze, the ecological disaster caused to the Japanese town in the 1970s by the massive dumping of heavy metal into water sources by a local factory. Using the Metalwork Photography® method, which relates to the transfer of photographic transparencies onto metal sheets, Levitas creates large metallic sculptures, seven of which were exhibited in the Museum within the framework of a multifaceted project. Using mainly aluminium, because of its flexibility, endurance and recyclable quality, Levitas highlights the ambiguity, duality and contradiction hidden in man’s relationship with the environment and in the technological evolution of humanity.

Curator: Marie Koutsomallis-Moreau Exhibition design: Andreas Georgiadis, Paraskevi Gerolymatou, Elix

Sotiris Sorogas The time of memory in his artistic language 22.12.2021-17.04.2022

“His work as an elegy on mortal matter and the expectation of resurrection“

(Kyriakos Koutsomallis, exhibition curator)

“When I accidentally discovered that one could become a painter, I felt as if I had found the way to my salvation. My life gained meaning and purpose which fulfilled greater needs, simultaneously formulating shadowy answers to the existential questions of a young man who remained stuck at dead ends“

(Sotiris Sorogas – excerpt from “A conversation with Sotiris Sorogas” Thanasis Th. Niarchos) 22.12.2021 saw the opening of an exhibition of works by distinguished painter Sotiris Sorogas from the Foundation’s Collection at the Museum in Athens. It contained around 20 mostly large works, covering the entire range of the painter’s artistic career through four thematic units: Stones, Horses, Portraits and Openings. At a time during which traditional values are being doubted, Sotiris Sorogas was and remains a scholarly painter who attempts, through his work and the modest colour range which dominates his painterly world, to balance between light and darkness, record the ravages of time and preserve the memory of absence and loss.

Curator: Kyriakos Koutsomallis Exhibition design: Andreas Georgiadis, Paraskevi Gerolymatou, Elix

Since its opening, the Museum in Athens offers its visitors guided tours of the permanent Collection, in groups or privately and in three languages, Greek, English and French. In 2021, apart from the permanent Collection, visitors also had the opportunity to take guided tours of the temporary exhibition ”Sotiris Sorogas - The time of memory in his artistic language”. Towards the end of 2021, the Foundation inaugurated the “Family Guided Tours” programme, which invites children and their families to discover the magical world and stories hidden in the Collection’s unique artworks through experiential artistic activities. In the short period in 2021 that school guided tours were allowed, the Foundation welcomed pupils on an interactive journey of discovery within the world of modern and contemporary art, through programmes designed by its experienced staff and fully adapted to the characteristics and needs of every age group, from pre-school to secondary school. At the same time, the Foundation sought to develop its digital educational materials setting as its medium term goal the elimination of geographical limitations and the provision of digital educational programmes of the highest standards around the thematic axis of Art, to as many pupils as possible in schools all over Greece, and beyond.

Creative workshops for children

Pavlos’ Confetti! (for children aged 5-6)

Through a retrospective look at the work of artists from the Collection who worked mainly with paper and upcycling, children were inspired to create their own magical constructions, turning paper into confetti and confetti into Art.

Concept/Implementation: Katerina Georgopoulou, Ioulia Marousi While the Earth sleeps… Christmas Camp (for children aged 6-10)

Through interactive guided tours, group games, Christmas constructions and creative workshops, inspired by Ernst’s dream world, Lichtenstein’s motifs, Pollock’s pseudonym, Rouan’s braids, César, Dubuffet και Hundertwasser’s bizarre chairs and Kandinsky’s colourful keyboards, children had the opportunity to observe, discuss and finally put themselves in the place of the artist and construct their own handmade, festive zine (art book).

Concept/Implementation: Katerina Georgopoulou, Rena Gyftoula, Ioanna Koutsouki, Ioulia Marousi, Vicky Christaki

Cubism, my portrait and recycling! (for children aged 9-12)

Through an interactive guided tour and an experiential exercise of observation and comparison, children learnt about the artistic movement of Cubism and one of its greatest exponents, Pablo Picasso. Using various recyclable materials they experimented with the technique of collage and created their own cubist sculptures while also learning about the benefits of recycling.

Concept/Implementation: Katerina Georgopoulou, Ioulia Marousi Parents and children celebrate at the Museum! Creative Christmas workshop for the whole family

On Sunday 26 December 2021, the Museum in Athens welcomed its visitors, children and adults, in the children’s workshop, for an innovative rendezvous with Henri Matisse and Roy Lichtenstein. The children and their entourage approached the works and techniques of these two great artists in a creative way and then made their own original cards and Christmas decorations.

Concept/Implementation: Katerina Georgopoulou, Ioanna Koutsouki, Ioulia Marousi, Vicky Christaki

Creative workshops for adolescents and adults

The Artist’s Mind – Filmmaking Masterclass by Andrew Levitas

Within the framework of the multifaceted Minamata project hosted by the Museum in Athens in the autumn of 2021, the American film director, producer and artist Andrew Levitas presented a four-day Filmmaking Masterclass based on the course he teaches at the NY University Gallatin School of Individualized Study. Participants had the opportunity to explore the broader process of creation, starting from the initial inspiration, which become the impetus for the creation of a short film. At the same time and through various experiential exercises such as the painted representation of their emotions, photography and writing, they acquired a more rounded awareness of their skills. After the completion of the Masterclass, participants had a year to create their own short film. Introduction to artistic jewellery Handmade jewellery workshop

The art of artistic jewellery unfolded through an innovative cycle of three workshops. Participants had the opportunity to express themselves creatively and learn various flexible handmade jewellery construction techniques whilst also gaining important theoretical and technical knowledge from the world of contemporary artistic jewellery.

Concept/Implementation: Eleana Karoumba

Youth dance performance Move More Morph It

The dance performance «Move More Morph It» performed by Belgian dancer Sarah Huby and choreographed by Anna Konjetzky took place on 12.6.2021, with free entry, on the roof of the neoclassical building of the Museum in Athens. Konjetzky’s new work, intended for a youth audience, poses questions which could be posed by any child on the threshold of adolescence, such as “how do I feel, how do others see me, how do I see myself?” It involves the effort of a body to compose its own soundtrack, embarking thus on a journey through a variety of identities and imaginary characters.

Production/project/organisation: Explore dance network-youth dance performances, Fabrik Potsdam, Focus Tanz/Tanz und Schule e.V. Munchen, Κ3 Dance Centre/Tanzplan Hamburg, Fabrik moves gUG Choreography/concept: Anna Konjetzky Dancer: Sarah Huby Composition, live performance: Sergej Maingardt Minamata avant-première

On 20.10.2021, the Foundation, in collaboration with Odeon, hosted the avant-première of Andrew Levitas’ film Minamata. In the film, award-winning actor Johnny Depp plays famous photo reporter W. Eugene Smith, recounting, in a powerful performance, his insistent three-year struggle to highlight the teratogenicties and diseases suffered by the population of the Japanese town as a result of industrial pollution. The avant-première took place in the Amphitheatre of the Museum in Athens and was attended by Andrew Levitas, who apart from director and producer also co-authored the film script alongside David Kessler, Stephen Deuters και Jason Forman. The film, first presented at the 2020 Berlinale, was released in Greek cinemas on 21.10.2021.

Meetings at the Museum

George Rorris and Marie Koutsomallis-Moreau On 21.7.2021, within the framework of the retrospective exhibition “George Rorris –The nobleness of purity”, George Rorris and exhibition

curator Marie Koutsomallis-Moreau met at the Museum in Athens and discussed the painter’s artistic career inspired by ten works from the exhibition. The meeting was broadcast online via live streaming and the Foundation’s Members had the opportunity to attend the discussion in the Museum’s Amphitheatre for free.

https://goulandris.gr/el/events/synanthseis-sto-mouseiogiorgos-rorris

Open discussions “Environmental awareness through art“

Once again, within the framework of the Minamata project, an open discussion took place at the Amphitheatre of the Museum in Athens on 24.10.2021, entitled “Environmental awareness through art”, with the participation of the Executive Director of the A.C. Laskaridis Foundation Dr Angeliki Kosmopoulou, film director Lefteris Charitos and film director and artist Andrew Levitas. The discussion was coordinated by radio producer and Managing Director of the ATHENS 9,84 radio station Margarita Mytilineou. The discussion took place in the Amphitheatre with free entry and was also broadcast online via live streaming.

https://goulandris.gr/el/events/synanthseis-sto-mouseioandrew-levitas

Visit by the Ecumenical Patriarch H.A.H. Bartholomew to the Museum in Athens

“From childhood we were touched by art, which, together with the faith in God, we considered a guide to the depth and truth of things“

Excerpt from speech by the Ecumenical Patriarch H.A.H. Bartholomew during his visit to the Museum in Athens

On 23.11.2021, within the framework of his official visit to Athens, Ecumenical Patriarch H.A.H. Bartholomew visited the Museum in Athens. He was welcomed by the President of the Foundation’s Board of Trustees Fl. Karadontis and Director Kyriakos Koutsomallis, in the presence of the Board of Trustees. Following the welcome speeches in the Museum’s Amphitheatre, the Ecumenical Patriarch was guided by Mr Koutsomallis through the Foundation’s permanent Collection. The Ecumenical Patriarch, well-known for his love of the arts but also his environmental sensitivity and activity, emphasized the close relationship between Orthodoxy and Art and welcomed the Foundation’s efforts to contribute to the public’s environmental awakening through the presentation of the multifaceted Minamata project.

The Library of the Museum in Athens is a mean of exploration and access to Art for the public. Its book collection includes over 7,000 items, which correspond to around 6,000 titles, mainly in Greek, English and French. Most of the books come from the personal book collection of its founders, Basil and Elise Goulandris as well as from more recent acquisitions and donations. The collection includes exhibition catalogues, monographs and reference works on distinguished Greek and international artists, Greek and overseas museum and Art foundation publications, art journals, encyclopaedias and art dictionaries. Visitors to the Library can use the reading area subject to making prior arrangements. The Library also hosts educational programmes for children and adolescents, lectures and activities relating to art and culture. September 2021 saw the publication to the public of the Library’s Digital Catalogue (http://library. goulandris.gr/) available in both Greek and English. Requiring only internet access, visitors can search basic or complex reference information. More and more visitors use the Library Digital Catalogue and are already aware of the material available to them before their visit.

Café-Restaurant Venue hire

Throughout 2021, the operation and menu of the B&E Goulandris Café-Restaurant remained under the attention of the experienced team of “IT Restaurant”, in collaboration with talented chef Chrysanthos Manolopoulos. It offers visitors an original and creative taste experience which showcases small producers from every corner of Greece and authentic local ingredients, with an emphasis on organic products, in an elegant space which is in direct harmony with the Museum’s overall aesthetics. Due to the extended period that the Museum in Athens remained closed and the restrictions imposed on gatherings within the overall measures for the prevention of the spread of Covid-19, venue hire in the Museum in Athens was particularly affected. Despite this and as of May, venue hire was permitted again, with strict health and safety measures in place. The Museum’s spaces available for hire proved particularly popular for numerous events by well-known organisations, as well as public and private companies.