✨Upcoming Exhibition✨
The DESTE Foundation for Contemporary Art, in partnership with the @thebenakimuseum are pleased to announce the exhibition "Irruption of Antiquity" by Aleksandra Waliszewska.
This transhistorical exhibition brings together the Benaki Museum’s rich, heterogeneous collections and the pictorial universe of the contemporary Polish artist Aleksandra Waliszewska. The exhibition pays homage to Greece as the birthplace of figurative, narrative art and as a foundation of Western visual culture—while also tracing its enduring presence in the visual imagination today. Waliszewska’s intense psychological tableaux manifest moments of “irruption”: the sudden, forceful entry of ancient visual tropes into the present.
Curated by Alison Gingeras @alisongingeras
💫The exhibition will be on view @thebenakimuseum (Pireos 138, Athens), starting on June 4th, 2026.
⚡Upcoming Exhibition⚡
"GEN X: TALES FROM THE FORGOTTEN GENERATION"
Drawing from the holdings of the Dakis Joannou Collection, "Gen X: Tales from the Forgotten Generation" brings together works by artists born between 1960 and 1980, the decades traditionally chosen as bookends for this generation.
The artists in this exhibition responded to these seismic shifts with varying degrees of sincerity, irony, and even cynicism. Often described as the “slacker” generation, they combined lowbrow aesthetics, self-deprecation, and a healthy disregard for convention. Debates around sexuality, gender, and the ongoing effects of the HIV/AIDS epidemic exerted a significant influence on the ways in which artists depicted bodies, birthing a disquieting army of decaying avatars, metallic cyborgs, and new mutant creatures. Identity politics emerged as a new battleground, while the media and fashion industries were analyzed, appropriated, and deconstructed in many of the works by this generational cohort.
Curated by Massimiliano Gioni
✨The show will be on view at the DESTE Foundation in Athens, starting on June 18th.
🎉OPENING JUNE 22🎉
✨️DURATION JUNE 23 - OCTOBER 31, 2026✨️
The DESTE Foundation for Contemporary Art is pleased to announce that this year, the Slaughterhouse Project on Hydra will feature an exhibition by Jamaican artist Nari Ward, who is renowned for his sculptural installations composed of discarded material found and collected in his neighbourhood. By re-contextualizing these found objects, Ward creates thought-provoking juxtapositions that address social and political issues surrounding race, poverty, and consumer culture.
The exhibition will be on view at DESTE's Project Space on Hydra island starting on June 23d.
Portrait of Nari Ward
📷 Alex Dupeux
Courtesy of the artist
#deste #destefoundation #projectspace #nariward
#hydra
ΔΕΣΤΕ 33+: 2015–2022 brings together seven years of exhibitions, commissions, texts, and conversations from the DESTE Foundation for Contemporary Art, tracing a period shaped by experimentation, collaboration, and an evolving dialogue between contemporary art and publishing.
More than an archive, the publication reflects the distinct visual and intellectual language DESTE has cultivated over the years: playful, conceptual, and deeply connected to contemporary culture.
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Founded in Greece by Dakis Joannou, DESTE has long maintained a close relationship with Hydra through projects, installations, and the annual exhibitions held at the Slaughterhouse, a space that has become deeply associated with the island’s contemporary cultural landscape.
Alongside this title, a wider selection of DESTE publications is now available at our bookstore.
#deste #destefoundation #hydrabookstore #hydraisland
Song by Hélène Vogelsinger
This summer, DESTE Foundation presents 'Until That Day' a new site-specific project by Nari Ward on the island of Hydra, opening June 23.
Known for his powerful sculptural installations made from found materials, Nari Ward reconfigures everyday objects into poetic and political narratives addressing race, migration, and collective memory. For Hydra, 'Until That Day' reflects on the Afro-Greek community and broader questions of identity, belonging, and coexistence, drawing inspiration from Haile Selassie’s historic call for global solidarity.
Nari Ward @nariward
'Until That Day'
June 23 – October 31, 2026
DESTE Foundation Project Space, Slaughterhouse @destefoundation
Hydra, Greece
Image: Ph. Marco De Scalzi, Courtesy Fondazione Nicola Trussardi, Milano
#NariWard #DESTEFoundation #Hydra #ContemporaryArt #ArtOpening #SiteSpecific #SlaughterhouseProject
🚨 Upcoming exhibition at DESTE Foundation's Project Space, Slaughterhouse on Hydra island.
"Until That Day" by Nari Ward @nariward starting on June 23, 2026.
Nari Ward (b. 1963, St. Andrew, Jamaica; lives and works in New York), is renowned for his sculptural installations composed of discarded material found and collected in his neighborhood. By re-contextualizing these found objects, he creates thought-provoking juxtapositions that address social and political issues surrounding race, poverty, and consumer culture.
George Condo: The Mad and the Lonely
Published by DESTE Foundation for Contemporary Art @destefoundation . Distributed by @artbook
Edited by Karen Marta. Text by George Condo and Dakis Joannou.
***Join us on March 25th at The Strand’s Rare Book Room, to celebrate the release of George Condo’s new art catalog, “George Condo: The Mad and the Lonely”. RSVP now through the link @strandbookstore ***
This forthcoming catalog documents George Condo’s exhibition “The Mad and The Lonely”, the site-specific installation at the DESTE Foundation’s Project Space at the Slaughterhouse on the island of Hydra in Greece, which included a number of small-scale paintings and sculptures selected from the artist’s long career and recontextualized in the storied space. With a vivid 40-page leporello, this book includes a text by Dakis Joannou and an essay by Condo himself that probes the many sites and sources of inspiration for “The Mad and The Lonely.”
Edited by @karenmarta
Designed by @theonlygarrickgott
Managed and produced by @tbradway
Printed by @faenzaprinting_italy
Hardcover, 10 x 10 in., 116 pgs, 78 color, 7 b&w.
U.S. $50.00, ISBN 9786185039455
@destefoundation@kmec_books@donkey301239@artistgeorgecondo #georgecondo #destefoundation #art #madness #contemporaryart
We are pleased to announce our upcoming exhibition titled Gen X: Tales from the Forgotten Generation, a survey of Gen X artists from the Dakis Joannou Collection.
The show will be on view at the DESTE Foundation in Athens, starting on June 18th.
✨ More information, will follow soon! ✨
📷 Video still: Douglas Gordon - Monument for X (1998)
