National Gallery-Museum of Alexandros Soutsos

Located in the centre of Athens, the National Gallery is a major attraction for visitors, both locals and tourists, as well as art students. The National Gallery-Museum of Alexandros Soutsos is one of the four branches of the National Gallery. The other three are located outside Attica. It is a proposal for those who want to get to know the modern Greek history through the works of famous artists. The first collections came from the National Technical University of Athens (NTUA) and the University of Athens. Important donations were added soon after. Today, the National Gallery's collection includes more than 20,000 works of painting, sculpture, engraving and other forms of art, and is the treasury of recent Greek artistic creation, covering a period from the post-Byzantine period to the present day. It also has a remarkable collection of Western European paintings. In 1954, the National Gallery was merged with the Alexandros Soutsos Estate, hence its double name. The jurist and art lover Alexandros Soutsos bequeathed his collection and property to the state with the aim of creating a "Museum of Fine Arts". The collection includes paintings, sculptures, prints, drawings and installations. Throughout the war, the Gallery's treasures remained hidden in the Archaeological Museum. The Permanent Exhibition of Modern Greek Art is divided into thematic sections: Post-Byzantine Art - Cretan School, The School of the Ionian Islands, Domenicos Theotokopoulos, The Painting of the Independent Greek State the years of the Reign of King Othon, the Bourgeois Class and its Painters, Around 1900, Modernism & Tradition, From Surface into Space, European Painting, Greek Interwar Printmaking - Teachers, Disciples, Successors and Modern Greek Prints. In addition to the permanent collection, there are also interesting temporary Exhibitions. The Gallery also has a very interesting Archive. In 2000, the National Gallery-Museum of Alexandros Soutsos celebrated its 100th anniversary. This historic anniversary was marked by the grand opening of the new presentation of the museum's permanent collections in the renovated interior, sponsored by the "Stavros S. Niarchos" Foundation. The permanent collections were presented from a modern museological point of view, following the parallel evolution of art and society. The "Information Society" project digitised and electronically recorded the artworks of the collections. In recent years, the National Gallery-Museum of Alexandros Soutsos has developed a large publishing activity in both printed and digital form, with important scientific catalogues accompanying the exhibitions and educational books for young people.