An exhibition celebrating the common cultural destiny of Greece and Italy and its impact on European culture will open its doors at the National Archaeological Museum in Athens from August 28 until October 31.

Entitled “Classicism and Europe: The destiny of Greece and Italy,” the exhibition was launched in Italy on March 28, to mark the start of the Italian presidency of the European Union, which succeeded that of Greece and it will now travel to Greece.

It features 23 masterpieces from Greece’s and Italy’s major museums, spanning a period of 4,500 years, from the early prehistoric civilizations of the Aegean to the Archaic era of the 6th century BC – including the Acropolis Kore and the relief of the ‘Pensive Athena’ – to sculpture representing the rise of democracy in ancient Greece and then the rise of Christianity through Byzantine art, right through the Renaissance, featuring works by El Greco and Mattia Preti and ending in the 20th century.

The exhibition is organised with the collaboration of the Italian EU presidency and Greece, via the foreign and culture ministries in both countries.