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The Benaki

The Benaki maintains a magnificent collection of Greek works from antiquity to modern times, all in an elegant neoclassical mansion.

Founded by art collector Antoni Benaki in 1931, the stunning private collection includes about 20,000 small and large works of art. There are treasures spanning from the Neolithic era to the 20th century.

Check out the folk art collection (including decadent costumes and icons). Step into the two entire rooms from 18th-century Northern Greek mansions, adorned by ancient Greek bronzes, gold cups, Fayum portraits, and rare early Christian textiles.

The 2003 renovation brought forth a new wing for special exhibitions, doubling the exhibition space of the original 20th-century neoclassical town house. The museum shop is excellent. The cafe on the roof garden offers a spectacular view over Athens, as well as a 25€ ($33) buffet dinner Thursday.

The Museum of Cycladic Art

Neofytou Douka 4 and Irodotou; 30-210-722-8321
Museum of Cycladic Art’s Website

Home to the world’s largest collection of Modigliani-like Cycladic art (outside the National Archaeological Museum). The island group that includes Mykonos as well as Delos, Milos, Naxos and Siros.

The handsome facade is home to the astonishing collection of Nicolas and Aikaterini Goulandris. Though relatively “new” (the museum opened its doors in 1986) the collection represents the deeply deeply “old.” There are more than 200 stone and pottery vessels and figurines from the 3rd millennium B.C.

Unlike the constant buzz of crowding museum whisperers, the Goulandris does not get the same huge crowds. Galleries are small and well lit, with labels throughout in Greek and English.

The collection of Greek vases is small and exquisite. Keep your eye out for the Cycladic pig. Nosh on a snack in the basement cafe, and ascend to the courtyard and view the museum’s “newest” acquisition, the elegant 19th-century Stathatos Mansion. The mansion, with some of its original furnishings, provides a glimpse of how wealthy Athenians lived a hundred years ago.

The National Archaeological Museum

A gorgeous collection of classical sculptures and gold treasures from Mycenae.

If you can only see one museum in Athens, make sure it is the National Archaeological Museum which was renovated and expanded for the 2004 Olympics. It is considered to be one of the top 10 museums in the world, unrivaled and featuring a collection of ancient Greek antiquities. You can never have the same experience walking through the great halls twice.

Make sure to see the Akrotiri frescoes (damaged in the 1999 earthquake and removed and now repaired on display). In addition to the “old” there are two “new” items:  a 4th-century B.C. gold wreath and a 6th-century B.C. marble statue of a young woman’s torso.

The Mycenaean Collection includes gold masks, cups, dishes, and jewelry unearthed from the site of Mycenae by Heinrich Schliemann in 1876. Many of these objects are small, delicate, and very hard to see when the museum is crowded.

Don’t miss the stunning burial mask that Schliemann misnamed the “Mask of Agamemnon.” Archaeologists are sure that the mask is not Agamemnon’s, but belonged to an earlier, unknown monarch. Also not to be missed are the stunning Vaphio cups, showing mighty bulls, unearthed in a tomb at a seemingly insignificant site in the Peloponnese.

If little Vaphio could produce these riches, what remains to be found in future excavations?
The museum also has a stunning collection of Cycladic figurines, named after the island chain.

Although these figurines are among the earliest known Greek sculptures (about 2,000 B.C.), you’ll be struck by how modern the idols’ faces look compared to those wrought by Modigliani. One figure, a musician with a lyre, seems to be concentrating on his music, cheerfully oblivious to his onlookers. If you are fond of these Cycladic sculptures, be sure to take in the superb collection at the N. P. Goulandris Foundation Museum of Cycladic Art.

A lot of scholarly ink has been spilled trying to prove that the god was holding either a thunderbolt (Zeus) or a trident (Poseidon). And who can resist the bronze figures of the handsome young men, perhaps athletes, seemingly about to step forward and sprint through the crowds?

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