National Museum of Contemporary Art

What I can see

This building now houses the collections of the National Museum of Contemporary Art. These collections are of international range and include paintings, drawings, sculptures, installations, audiovisual material, sound, and online projects by internationally renowned artists. Regarding the six-storey building, the facades on Syngrou Avenue and Frantzi Street are preserved and emphasize the horizontal dimension and the harmony of the building. The Kallirois Street facade is coated with materials referring to the rocks of the bed of Ilissos river, which has been covered. In many ways, however, this symbolic coating significantly alters the architectural character of the building.

What I can't see

The Bavarian John Fix created Athens’ first small brewery in 1864, in Kolonaki. His son, Charles, developed the business further by building a factory. This building was later replaced with a newer building by architect Takis Zenetos, one of the main proponents of modernism in Greece. The “lying” or “horizontal skyscraper”, as it was called, had the double length, but half the building was demolished. There was a resulting debate, with citizen participation, as to whether it should be torn down completely or not. It was the first time that there had been such interest in a specimen of modern architecture. Until then, interest was primarily confined to neoclassical and eclectic buildings, which demonstrated the bias against modern and contemporary architecture. The solution finally came from a resolution of the Greek Institute of Architecture, which decided unanimously that the building was “one of the most important works of modern Greek architecture with international reach and is also a great landmark of the Athens urban environment.”

Info

• Address: Syggrou & Frantzi St.
• Phone: +30 210 9242111-3
• E-mail: [email protected]
• Website: http://www.emst.gr

Bibliography