Exhibition: “Routes of Icons 17th-20th century” at Benaki Museum, Athens

Exhibition: “Routes of Icons 17th-20th century”
Benaki Museum, Athens
December 8, 2022 – February 5, 2023

The exhibition explores the iconographic, stylistic and technical diversity of icons that circulated in the Greek Orthodox space between the 17th and 19th centuries, sourcing material from the collections of the Benaki Museum.

The concept of ‘Greek Orthodox space’ is approached not merely as a geographical entity but, above all, as a social construction, sustained by the close community ties generated by the Orthodox identity that was shared by populations with different traditions, political loyalties, even language. The shared Byzantine background created a uniform legacy of iconographic themes and technical solutions that were constantly enriched in each centre of production in a variety of ways. However, these common components were not dissolved; rather, they allowed the transfer of icons from place to place and their coexistence within the same places of worship, from Russia to the Ionian Islands, Crete, the Aegean and Asia Minor.

A special section of the exhibition presents new technical data that emerged from the ongoing ERC RICONTRANS research project, granting the public unique in-depth access to selected works through the stereomicroscope.

This exhibition is part of RICONTRANS Project, which has received funding from the European Research Council (ERC) under the European Union’s Horizon 2020 research and innovation programme (grant agreement No 818791).