Release Date: December 10, 2015

National Gallery of Art Celebrates Hellenistic Bronzes Exhibition with Array of Related Public Offerings from Contemporary Greek Films to a Greek-themed Café

Film still from Little England (Pantelis Voulgaris, 2013, DCP, subtitles, 132 minutes), to be shown at the National Gallery of Art on Saturday, January 16, at 2:30 p.m., as part of the "Athens Today: New Greek Cinema" film series. Images courtesy of Feelgood Entertainment.

Washington, DC—The National Gallery of Art is pleased to present a variety of public programs, a specialty shop, and a Greek-themed buffet to celebrate Power and Pathos: Bronze Sculpture of the Hellenistic World. Programs include symposia, lectures and spoken-word performances, gallery talks, a concert, and a long list of stellar Greek films. The Gallery Shops offer items ranging from exquisite jewelry in bronze to reproductions of ancient sculpture. The Garden Café will offer a Greek-themed buffet menu of traditional dishes.

All programs take place in the East Building Auditorium unless otherwise noted, and are free of charge. Seating is available on a first-come, first-seated basis.

Lectures
Introduction to the Exhibition—Power and Pathos: Bronze Sculpture of the Hellenistic World
December 13 at 2:00 p.m.
Jens M. Daehner and Kenneth S. Lapatin, associate curators of antiquities, The J. Paul Getty Museum. A book signing of the exhibition catalog Power and Pathos: Bronze Sculpture of the Hellenistic World follows.

Bronzes from the Aegean: The Lost Cargos and the Circumstances of Their Recovery
January 17 at 2:00 p.m.
George Koutsouflakis, director, department of archaeological sites, monuments, and research, Hellenic Ephorate of Underwater Antiquities. This program is cosponsored by the Washington, DC, Society of the Archaeological Institute of America.

What Makes a Statue?
February 7 at 2:00 p.m.
Carol Mattusch, Mathy Professor of Art History, George Mason University

The Bronze Sculpture of Hellenistic Macedonia
February 21 at 2:00 p.m.
Polyxeni Adams-Veleni, archaeologist and director, Archaeological Museum of Thessaloniki
This program is coordinated with Eleftherios Ikonomou, ARTS etc. Intercultural Dialogues, Berlin, with generous funding from the Goelet Corporation, New York.

From Olympus to the Streets of Constantinople: The Byzantine Retirement of the Ancient Gods
March 3 at 3:30 p.m.
West Building Lecture Hall
Anthony Kaldellis, professor of classics, Ohio State University
This program is coordinated with and supported by Dumbarton Oaks Research Library and Collection.

Zeus, Isis, and Dionysus in Dion at the Foothills of Mount Olympus
March 17 at 3:30 p.m.
Dimitrios Pandermalis, president of the board of directors, Acropolis Museum, and professor of archaeology, Aristotle University of Thessaloniki
This program is coordinated with Eleftherios Ikonomou, ARTS etc. Intercultural Dialogues, Berlin, with generous funding from the Goelet Corporation, New York.

Panel Discussions
The Afterlives of Alexander in the Byzantine World
February 11 at 3:30 p.m.
West Building Lecture Hall
Panelists include Ioli Kalavrezou, Dumbarton Oaks Professor of Byzantine Art History, department of history of art and architecture, Harvard University; Dimitris Kastritsis, lecturer, School of History, University of St. Andrews; and Jonathan Shea, postdoctoral teaching fellow in Byzantine history, Dumbarton Oaks Research Library and Collection and George Washington University. Moderated by Michael Maas, director of Byzantine studies 2015–2016, Dumbarton Oaks Research Library and Collection. This program is coordinated with and supported by Dumbarton Oaks Research Library and Collection.

A Priestess or a Goddess: The Problem of Identity in Some Female Hellenistic Sculptures
February 18 at 3:30 p.m.
West Building Lecture Hall
This program is coordinated with and supported by the Center for Hellenic Studies, Harvard University.

A Poet or a God: The Iconography of Certain Bearded Male Bronzes
February 25 at 3:30 p.m.
West Building Lecture Hall
This program is coordinated with and supported by the Center for Hellenic Studies, Harvard University.

Performances with Discussion
Performances of archaeological-musical tales will combine games, music, storytelling, and songs performed with an ancient reconstructed lyre. Discussions will center on the cultural heritage of Greece in relation to each performance.

Kymothoi's Journey
February 24 at 3:30 p.m.
West Building Lecture Hall
Evy Papadopoulou, archaeologist; Nikos Xanthoulis, assistant researcher, Academy of Athens, and tutor, Greek Open University. This program is coordinated with Eleftherios Ikonomou, ARTS etc. Intercultural Dialogues, Berlin, with generous funding from the Goelet Corporation, New York.

Nikias and Meliti’s Dream
February 26 at 3:30 p.m.
West Building Lecture Hall
Evy Papadopoulou, archaeologist; Nikos Xanthoulis, assistant researcher, Academy of Athens, and tutor, Greek Open University. This program is coordinated with Eleftherios Ikonomou, ARTS etc. Intercultural Dialogues, Berlin, with generous funding from the Goelet Corporation, New York.

Homer’s Iliad and Odyssey
February 27 at 1:00 p.m.
Evy Papadopoulou, archaeologist; Nikos Xanthoulis, assistant researcher, Academy of Athens, and tutor, Greek Open University. This program is coordinated with Eleftherios Ikonomou, ARTS etc. Intercultural Dialogues, Berlin, with generous funding from the Goelet Corporation, New York.

Public Symposia
Power and Pathos: Bronze Sculpture of the Hellenistic World
March 18 at 2:30 p.m.
Illustrated lectures by Gianfranco Adornato, professor of classical archaeology, Scuole Normale Superiore, Pisa; Andrew Stewart, professor of ancient Mediterranean art and archaeology and Nicholas C. Petris Professor of Greek Studies, University of California, Berkeley, and curator of Mediterranean archaeology, Hearst Museum of Anthropology

Power and Pathos: Bronze Sculpture of the Hellenistic World
March 19 at noon
West Building Lecture Hall
Illustrated lectures by Christopher A. Gregg, assistant professor of art history, George Mason University; Despina Ignatiadou, head curator of the sculpture collection, National Archaeological Museum, Athens; Kenneth S. Lapatin, associate curator of antiquities, The J. Paul Getty Museum; Richard Mason, lecturer on Aegean archaeology and Egypt, University of Maryland, Baltimore County; Carol Mattusch, Mathy Professor of Art History, George Mason University; David Sider, professor of classics, New York University. Symposium respondents include Jens M. Daehner, associate curator of antiquities, The J. Paul Getty Museum; and Brunilde Sismondo Ridgway, Rhys Carpenter Professor Emerita of Classical and Near Eastern Archaeology, Bryn Mawr College. Moderated by Faya Causey, head of academic programs, National Gallery of Art.

Teacher Materials
For teachers who wish to receive materials prior to visiting the exhibition, please contact [email protected].

Concert
Music from the Age of Mythology
National Gallery of Art Vocal Ensemble
January 31 at 3:30 p.m.
West Building, West Garden Court

Gallery Talks
Regular public tours of Power and Pathos: Bronze Sculpture of the Hellenistic World will be offered by the adult programs department of the education division (50 mins.). Meet at the West Building Rotunda. Eric Denker: January 6–8, 12, 14, 19, 21 at 12:00, January 20, 22 at 2:00; David Gariff: February 1, 3, 5, 12–18 at 1:00; Diane Arkin: February 9–11, 22–25 at 2:00

Gallery Shops
A specialty shop located at the exit of the exhibition includes an array of richly detailed bronze and sautoir jewelry, an exquisite 24-karat-gold-plated Athena Crown, period music CDs, scholarly monographs, Greek cookbook travel guides, children's activity kits, and reproductions of renowned ancient sculptures.

Exhibition Catalog
Published by the J. Paul Getty Museum, the fully illustrated scholarly exhibition catalog is the first comprehensive volume on Hellenistic bronze statuary. It includes groundbreaking archaeological, art-historical, and scientific essays that offer new approaches to understanding ancient production of these remarkable works of art. The 368-page catalog is currently available. To order, please visit http://shop.nga.gov/; call (800) 697-9350 or (202) 842-6002; fax (202) 789-3047; or e-mail [email protected].

Garden Café Greek-Themed Menu
A Greek-themed buffet ($20.75) incorporates a variety of traditional Greek dishes featuring fresh seasonal ingredients, from Psiti Feta Kotópoulo (braised chicken, feta cheese, red wine) to Salata Revithi Ankinara (chickpeas, artichokes, toasted almonds). Kasseri, a sheep- and goat-milk cheese with a salty and sweet flavor and pungent aroma, and Manouri, a pure sheep-milk cheese with a creamy texture, are available. Mosaiko, a Greek chocolate-and-biscuit cookie roll with fresh whipped cream, adds a sweet treat to the end of a culinary journey.

Attractive recipe cards for selected dishes are available to guests free of charge. Italian and Spanish white and red wines complement the menu. A variety of non-alcoholic beverages is also offered.

The Garden Café is open Monday through Saturday, 11:30 a.m. to 3:00 p.m., and Sunday, noon to 4:00 p.m. One of the most distinctive dining spots in the nation's capital, the Garden Café setting features a delightful 19th-century French marble sculpture after Jacopo Sansovino, Bacchus and a Faun, and a fountain with Herbert Adams's delicate bronze Girl with Water Lilies (model 1928). The Garden Café is located in the West Building near the entrance at 6th Street and Constitution Avenue NW. To make reservations for groups of eight or more, please contact the café manager at (202) 712-7454. For more information about the Gallery and its restaurants, visit http://www.nga.gov/visit/cafe.html.

Documentary Film
A film produced by the Gallery in conjunction with the exhibition and made possible by the HRH Foundation provides an overview of art of the Hellenistic period. Narrated by actor Liev Schreiber, the film includes new footage of the ancient sites of Delphi, Corinth, and Olympia, which once were crowded with bronze statues.

Audio Tour
For the first time, the Gallery is offering a free audio tour that visitors can download to their mobile devices. Narrated by Earl A. Powell III, director, National Gallery of Art, the tour includes commentary from exhibition curators Jens M. Daehner and Kenneth Lapatin, and bronze specialist Carol C. Mattusch of George Mason University.

Film Program
Zorba the Greek (restored print)
Introduced by Katherine Quinn, widow of Anthony Quinn
January 10 at 4:00 p.m. for the public

Documentary Series
January 5–March 17
West Building Lecture Hall
The documentary series is organized with AGON (Archaeological Film of the Mediterranean Area) and Eleftherios Ikonomou. It includes 12 films, produced in Greece and Germany, that deal with a range of cultural topics including the restoration work on the Acropolis monuments, Hellenistic-era musical instruments such as the “Hydraulis” (or hydraulic organ), Kouros sculptures, Lysippus (the legendary sculptor), the precious-metal trade routes during classical antiquity, the restoration work on the famous sculpture “The Praying Boy” cast ca. 300 B.C., and the world’s first computer constructed in ancient Greece—the so-called “Antikythera Mechanism” retrieved in underwater archaeology.
                                                                                               
Contemporary Film Series
Athens Today: A New Greek Cinema 
January 9–February 28
The cinema of Greece has been experiencing an artistic resurgence by way of a new generation of filmmakers who are enlivening the critical discourse and garnering attention at international festivals. As represented in the formal experiments of Yorgos Lanthimos and Athina Rachel Tsangari, or the performative aesthetics of films like Silent, this new wave has resulted in disarming and at times disquieting narratives. Traditional genres such as melodrama and black comedy have been enriched with fanciful and absurdist motifs. A sense of reinvention, if not a new film language, is palpable.  With special thanks to James Demetro, New York City Greek Film Festival, Anthony Quinn Foundation, Hellenic American Chamber of Commerce, National Hellenic Society, and the Hellenic American Cultural Foundation.

A Family Affair
January 9 at 3:30 p.m.
The Xylouris Ensemble, a multigenerational family of musicians rooted in folkloric Cretan music, traces their lineage to the mountain village of Anogeia. A Family Affair not only follows their performances and trials during wearisome tours, it captures the passing of tradition from father to son to grandchildren in this family that now lives mainly in Australia. “We don’t carry this tradition as a family weight,” explains George Xylouris. “It’s part of our lives, of who we are. We need this tradition to live, like we need oxygen.” (Angeliki Aristomenopoulou, 2015, DCP, subtitles, 88 minutes)

Little England
January 16 at 2:30 p.m.
Women on the lush Cycladic island of Andros in the 1930s await the homecoming of their seafaring husbands, fathers, sons, and brothers. Within this provincial society, an intense and richly structured melodrama emerges around two sisters’ relationships with the same man. Inspired by a popular novel by Ioanna Karystiani (who also wrote the script), Little England is visually lavish—a fresco of raging sea and rustic landscape, recalling an earlier era of narrative filmmaking. Since the 1960s, director Pantelis Voulgaris has been one of the masters of Greek cinema and a leading figure in sparking the recent wave of newly energized filmmaking. (Pantelis Voulgaris, 2013, DCP, subtitles, 132 minutes) 

Chevalier
January 24 at 4:00 p.m.
Six men on a yacht in the Aegean begin trading anecdotes that sound like fish stories. They agree to play a game: while on the boat they will engage in a contest for the duration of the trip, judging each one’s manliness in a variety of categories. At the end, the best man will collect a victory ring—the chevalier. This latest allegorical feature from Athina Rachel Tsangari delves into a shadowy male world of rivalry and aggression. “A committedly deadpan comedy of manners, morals, and men behaving weirdly boasts a contained conceit seemingly ripe for unfettered absurdism”—Guy Lodge. (Athina Rachel Tsangari, 2015, DCP, subtitles, 99 minutes)

Xenia
February 7 at 4:00 p.m.
Two brothers meet in Athens for a road trip to Thessaloniki, where they hope to track down their estranged biological father—a Greek who never married their now-deceased Albanian mother. Greece’s entry in the 2014 Oscar competition and Un Certain Regard competitor at Festival de Cannes, Xenia mixes madcap humor with compassion and poignancy to present “a sweeping yet precise examination of a country that, like its two young heroes, is in the thick of a difficult transition”—Dimitri Eipides. The word xenia references a Greek tradition of hospitality toward strangers, “an appropriate title for a film that gladly accommodates all manner of curiosities, from giant talking rabbits to chest-rug dream sequences to a cameo from venerable Italian pop diva Patty Pravo”—Guy Lodge. (Panos H. Koutras, 2014, DCP, subtitles, 2014)

Forever
Filmmaker Margarita Manda in person
February 14 at 4:00 p.m.
Costas, a driver on the Athens rapid transit green line (ISAP), finds himself enamored of Anna, a passenger he notices daily taking his train from Athens to Piraeus. Too wary to reach out, Costas remains content to quietly watch as Anna makes the daily trek to her job as a ticket seller. An unforeseen event finally offers Costas his golden opportunity. Forever’s poetic mood, monochromatic palette, and stylized mise-en-scène establish a sense of place without dialogue. Alluding to the beauty of silent film and one of early cinema’s key motifs—trains—director Manda describes Forever as “an homage to every filmmaker I consider a teacher, from Dreyer and Bresson to Antonioni and Angelopoulos.” (Margarita Manda, 2014, DCP, subtitles, 82 minutes)

Silent
February 28 at 4:00 p.m.
A young opera singer named Dido (Kika Georgiou) is suddenly struck by a mysterious debility that blocks her brain’s circuitry controlling her voice. Forced to return to Greece after living abroad, Dido is convinced her career has ended. She detaches herself from her family and attempts to regain stability, but ultimately finds herself retreating into a darker past as familiar ties break down. “The truth of the matter is that our era ‘speaks’ more than any other. . . . What eventually is said and how liberating that might be is, in fact, the question Silent aims to answer ”—YG. (Yorgos  Gkikapeppas, 2015, DCP, subtitles, 92 minutes)