For the first time in Greece, 182 photographs by Yorgos Lanthimos reveal a more personal, artistic side of his creative universe. Images that oscillate between the familiar and the bizarre open a rare window into the gaze of one of the most important creators of contemporary cinema.

Υοrgos Lanthimos,one of the most distinctive auteurs in world cinema, has been internationally recognized for his creation of fantastical worlds and his bold, paradoxical explorations of human relationships, characteristics that have established him as one of the most distinctive voices in contemporary cinema.

The Onassis Stegi has shown a long-standing interest in photography through a series of important exhibitions, including those of Robert Mapplethorpe, Helmut Newton, Christian Boltanski, and Juergen Teller. In his first collaboration with the Onassis Cultural Centre, Lanthimos brings together four series of works, comprising a total of 182 photographs from the last five years, which offer new perspectives for a deeper understanding of this unique and idiosyncratic visionary.

Photographs born within the spaces of his films, taken on the sidelines of filming, but also an ongoing personal series of photographs that Lanthimos is creating in Greece, the fruit of his solitary tours of Athens and his visits to the Aegean islands.

“Photography has become an important part of my life, beyond cinema, and it gives me much more freedom. I feel that there are fewer rules related to conventional storytelling.” – Yorgos Lanthimos

Throughout Lanthimos’ photographic work, there is a discernible contemplative engagement with the mundane and the familiar. With his lens, he renders the immediacy of his subject matter with unparalleled clarity and intimacy, capturing a unique and complex world. As in his cinema, a language emerges that functions as an archive of its own creation, a luminous representation of phenomena.