National Gallery of Athens

The National Gallery is also known as the Alexandros Soutzos Museum, after the gallery’s most prominent benefactor. It stands out particularly for its nineteenth and twentieth century Greek painting and sculpture collection.

Exhibitions

The museum’s central building remains closed since 2013 for renovation work.

When it was first established, the art gallery had a collection of 117 paintings which grew year after years thanks to private donations. Nowadays, it displays approximately 20,000 works of art by Greek and European artists.

The numerous art forms are exposed chronologically, and include paintings, sculptures, engravings, drawings and many other varieties.

Although the museum is mostly devoted to Greek works of art, visitors will also admire pieces by Bruegel, Caravaggio, Delacroix, El Greco and Picasso.

Not as good as hoped

Even though the National Gallery is the most prominent museum in Greece with over one hundred years of activity, in our opinion, it is not as impressive as the National Gallery in London or the Prado Museum in Madrid.