Showing results 13 - 21 of 21 for the tag: Michael Photiadis.
When the New Acropolis Museum was being designed, the artefacts within it were considered as the factor that would define its eventual form. In this respect, the building is an anti-Bilbao – the form of the building is generated from the function, rater than a form being defined with the function them examined to see how it can fit within.
The museum at the Acropolis is no mere shell. According to architect Michael Photiadis it was designed from “the inside out” to highlight the artifacts over architectural considerations.
It somehow seems fitting that a museum built to showcase the architectural legacy of a temple honouring the warrior goddess Athena should itself be the outcome of numerous battles, some as yet unresolved.
For instance, Greek authorities required not one but four bare-knuckled design competitions – the first held more than 30 years ago – before deciding architects Bernard Tschumi of New York and Athens-based Michael Photiadis would bear the responsibility of creating the New Acropolis Museum.
The British Museum is running out of time in which to return the Elgin Marbles before the New Acropolis Museum highlights the missing pieces for the whole world to see.
At Athens’s New Acropolis Museum, the most popular exhibit is in London.
That absent art would be what the Greeks label the Parthenon Marbles, the British brand the Elgin Marbles and what the sculptor Greg Wyatt reckons are history’s most important and fought-over examples of priceless classical sculpture.
The New Acropolis Museum in Athens is due to open imminently. Unfortunately though, there is still no sign of its star exhibits being there for the opening.
Walking through bright sunshine and crowds of tourists in an Athenian street, I glanced down and read the publicity blurb in my hand. The story was there, contained in just a few words: “Museum mission: to house all the surviving antiquities from the Acropolis within a single museum of international stature.” Actually the entire story is distilled into one word: ALL. But they might have added that it has been a 207-year mission to return the so-called Elgin Marbles – the first being cut down from the Parthenon on July 31, 1801.
A little further up the road and both buildings are in sight: to my right, rising from a skirt of trees, is the knobbly hill of the Acropolis, crowned by the Parthenon; to my left, behind some low buildings, is the New Acropolis Museum. The international stature of the Parthenon requires no words, but does this new museum live up to the lofty ambition? And the big question: does it have the requisite stature even when ALL the antiquities are not present – because half of them are in London?
After much speculation & various conflicting reports, it now appears in the New Acropolis Museum, the copies of the British Museum’s Parthenon Sculptures will be displayed with a whiter colour than the authentic sculptures that they sit amongst. There is a certain irony in this of course, harking back to the cleaning controversy of the 1930s. Maybe once the actual sculptures are returned, they will still look much whiter.
The opening of the New Acropolis Museum later this year will represent one of the most significant events in the museums world for some time – not necessarily because of the building’s facilities, but because of what it will stand for. The question remains though over whether the British Museum will acknowledge this fact & allow the Elgin Marbles to be reunited in their rightful home.
A new museum will open in Athens later this year. No big deal, you might think. You’d be wrong. The New Acropolis Museum is not merely a dazzling piece of modernist architecture, but the latest gambit in a 200-year campaign for the return of the Elgin Marbles.
The museum, which has been 30 years in the planning and has cost the Greek government more than £100m, will at last provide a permanent home for the greatest treasures of the classical period, safe from the city’s corrosive, polluted air.
After visiting Athens, Mary Beard has concluded that the spaces within the New Acropolis Museum are very impressive & live up to all expectations. She is still not convinced however about how well the outside sits with the rest of the city. Personally, I think that in a few years, people will get used to its look & learn to appreciate it as part of the city.
The New Acropolis Museum is good . . .
. . . from the inside at least. I’m not so sure about the outside.
I’ve been in Athens for a few days and the main purpose was to see round the New Acropolis Museum, nearly finished and with a few sculptures already installed. My expectations were a bit muted, and I’d read rather too much about the whole thing being a mausoleum for the missing Elgin Marbles.
Actually it was, in all sorts of ways, a very nice surprise. The top floor where the Parthenon Marbles are to be displayed worked especially well – looking directly at the temple on the Acropolis itself and, as the jargon goes, having “a conversation” with it (though one of my Greek friends did mutter darkly about it being a rather one-sided conversation).
A new home for the Elgin Marbles?
A follow-up article to Malcolm Brabant’s broadcast about the New Acropolis Museum. The museum has been & in the minds of many people, always will be controversial, due to its proximity to one of the worlds most iconic archaeological sites. Once the building opens however, many perceptions will change & evolve as people finally get a chance to experience the building themselves.
The Acropolis Museum is now just months away from entering service in Greece’s struggle with its most implacable cultural adversary.
Its priceless treasures lie in marble halls, hidden from view in giant removal boxes.
BBC reporter Malcolm Brabant has been shown round the New Acropolis Museum in Athens & reports on its progress & how it will act as a powerful argument for the return of the Parthenon Marbles.
You can watch the broadcast online here.