NATIONAL MUSEUM of CONTEMPORARY ART Athens

NATIONAL MUSEUM OF CONTEMPORARY ART

ATHENS, GREECE

Caroline Laspas

The place most people are heading to for this are museums. They are proving to be a real form of positive mental wellbeing therapy.

We all lost our routines with the pandemic and had to cope with unexpected changes, but are now getting back to a new way of life.

Now that museums are open, they are increasingly helping to assist people in a healing process. This is not a new phenomenon, throughout time we have turned to art as a way to express and understand the complex emotional impact an event has on us, as individuals, a community or on human history.

Museums are the best way to overcome this imposed artificial and anti-social life of further digitalisation and sanitation. A museum allows you to spend time wandering around its rooms and galleries viewing arts of all kinds and eras and styles.

Within the walls of almost any museum, you forget what is going on outside and for a moment every day life stands still.

One such museum is the almost unkown global museum; the National Museum of Contemporary Art Athens (EMST), located in the Greek capital.

Located in the former FIX brewery, which is a short walk from the centre of the city, the buildings reconstruction is now open to the public with a host of events and exhibitions on offer.

The museum acquires, safeguards, preserves, documents, researches and exhibits works of contemporary Greek and international art. In addition, the museum aims to promote the education of the arts and raise public awareness regarding contemporary culture, in combination with the development of scientific research and specialisation in museology, history and theory of contemporary art. One of its founding goals is to promote innovative and experimental artistic movements and the production of audio-visual works via new media.

It is not only the exhibits that inspire visitors, but the building itself has a soothing presence that is apt for this period in our lives now.

In a constantly changing world, EMST represents the exchange of ideas and perspectives through contemporary art, enriching the daily lives of all who visit.

Core to the museum’s collection is a very important collection of works by Greek and international artists, such as Jannis Kounellis, Stephen Antonakos, Gary Hill, Vlassis Caniaris, Chryssa, Mona Hatoun, Emily Jacir, Ilya and Emilia Kabakov, Kim Sooja, Nikos Kessanlis, Shirin Neshat, Lucas Samaras, Costas Tsoclis, Bill Viola, Joseph Kosuth, Pedro Cabrita Reiss, Costas Varotsos, George Lappas, Oliver Ressler and Gulsun Karamustafa.

So, now is the perfect time to visit this contemporary art museum during your next city break to Athens and absorb the clean, calm, cool galleries with inspiring unique works of art.

Photos are courtesy from several sites