The National Archaeological Museum welcomes contemporary creation, opening a dialogue between cultural heritage and contemporary art. The two-way relationship takes place in the exhibition “Yesterday is now. George Lazogas: Myths and Antiquity” in the temporary exhibition hall.  Works by the artist George Lazogas are intertwined with artifacts from the National Archaeological Museum, from the prehistoric, archaic and classical periods.

Πήλινο ειδώλιο Νίκης / Cley figurine of Nike

As the Minister of Culture and Sports, Lina Mendoni, stated “the exhibition of George Lazogas at the National Archaeological Museum is an important step in the interconnection and synthesis of cultural heritage with contemporary creation, which is currently a political priority of the Ministry of Culture and Sports. The cultural capital of Greece is unified and that is how we treat it.  We are, at the same time, presenting our unique cultural stock with the work of our contemporary creators, in an organic and essential relationship. Visitors to the exhibition can discover a new, different way of reading and decoding the ancient works of the National Archaeological Museum, as well as Lazogas’ creations. His works, as palimpsests of time, converse with selected antiquities, sculptures and vases, inscriptions and fragments. The past harmoniously accompanies the present. His creative wanderings in the past, in direct visual contact with the antiquities, create associations that refer to the great timelessness of Greek culture and invite us to constant reflection. History acquires a contemporary reading. The classic is discovered in a new conceptual approach”.

Θραύσματα όστρακα 2000 / Fragments 2000

In the exhibition, which opens to the public on Monday 9 May 2022, 30 works, 28 drawings and in 2 showcases 21 drawings and 2 books by Giorgos Lazogas “coexist” with 23 specially selected ancient artistic creations from the collections of the National Archaeological Museum. The exhibition reminds the general public of Lazogas’ multifaceted engagement with the past and the imaginary dialogue created between yesterday and today.

Το στήσιμο της έκθεσης / Exhibition setting

George Lazogas, professor emeritus of the Athens School of Fine Arts, was born in 1945 in Larissa. He studied architecture at the Aristotle University of Thessaloniki (1963-1970) and painting in Paris on a scholarship from the French government. He has participated in more than thirty group exhibitions since 1970 and has held a number of solo exhibitions. Until 1999 he was a professor at the Department of Architecture of the Aristotle University of Thessaloniki and from 2008-2012 at the Athens School of Fine Arts. In 2008 he created a permanent art installation for the Athens metro station “Eleonas”. He lives and works in Athens.

In his works the artist retrieves historical and mythological fragments creating new visual and conceptual narratives. Each reference is transformed into enigmatic allegories of the present, into visual stories that unfold “in secret”, mobilizing the imagination.

The exhibition is divided into three sections, “escapes to the Mediterranean”, “fragments of memory” and “transformations of images. They are palimpsests of time, a concept established by Lazogas in the terminology of domestic art history in the 1970s, describing the stratigraphies of an image at different moments in time.

The curators of the exhibition are Dr. Anna-Vassiliki Karapanagiotou, Director of the Museum, Dr. Evangelos Vibliodetes, Head of the Department of Exhibition Communication and Education of the EAM, while the museological study was carried out by art historian Bea Papadopoulou.

The visit to the exhibition is free of charge by showing only the ticket at the Museum.

For more information:

Phone numbers: 213214 4800, -4856

www.namuseum.gr