As part of its series of innovative archaeological exhibitions and in collaboration with the Ministry of Culture and Sports, the Museum of Cycladic Art presents the emblematic archaeological exhibition “ΚΑΛΛΟΣ. The Ultimate Beauty”, curated by the Museum’s director Nikolaos Stambolidis and the curator of antiquities Dr. Ioannis Fappas. The exhibition will run from September 29, 2021 until January 16, 2022 and is being supported by L’Oreal.

Through a series of 300 emblematic antiquities from Greece and abroad, the exhibition features the various aspects of the notion of beauty in everyday life and the philosophical thought of ancient Greece. This very significant exhibition will occupy all the exhibition rooms of the Museum.

The ancient Greek word “κάλλος” which means beauty refers to the female and the male sex. However, the notion of κάλλος in its ultimate dimension is not just a word meaning “beauty”. It is an ideal which was developed in the ancient Greek thought, expressed through the poems of the epic (8th c. BC) and the lyric poets (7th-6th c. BC) and gradually crystallized in the philosophical texts from the 5th/4th c. BC on, which referred to it as a combination of appearance and virtues of the soul. The exhibition focuses on this dimension of “κάλλος”, highlighting the contribution of ancient Greece in the definition of the notion of beauty up to this day.

The exhibition will show 300 antiquities from museums and collections of Greece, Italy and the Vatican.