Athens is often called the cradle of philosophy and democracy. Even though historically both philosophy and democracy first emerged as concepts in the Greek cities of ancient Asia Minor it was in Athens where they flourished for over two centuries, where democratic institutions became philosophy in practice.

Here philosophy was exercised and taught in the free public space amongst equal citizens. Both philosophy and democracy openly questioned traditional norms and ideals in theory and in practice; through oration and dialogue, the urban landscape forged the Athenian way of life. Philosophy was initially taught and practiced in the ancient Agora but also, eventually, Schools were founded in the outskirts of the city.

Nowadays, the traces of that ancient city are still visible in modern Athens, and invite our imagination to a venture through history and theory that combines a visit at the physical spaces where the greatest philosophers taught with a seminar about the theoretical concepts they invented.

On the occasion of this year’s August Full Moon, the Acropolis Museum will offer to its visitors the opportunity to enjoy the Museum exhibits as follows:
 
On Saturday 21 August 2021, the Museum exhibition areas will remain open from 8am to 8pm with free entry to all visitors, on the occasion of the Museum’s participation in the "Greece 2021" initiative.

The Museum second floor restaurant will be open until 12 midnight and visitors will be able to enjoy the moon from the terrace for dinner/drinks (telephone reservations on +30 210 9000915).
 
On Sunday 22 August 2021, the Museum exhibition areas will remain open from 8am to 10pm. The second floor restaurant will be open during the same hours.

• English: 6 p.m. (2 simultaneous talks)
• Greek: 8 p.m. (2 simultaneous talks)
• Duration: 60 minutes
• Participation: Limited to 10 visitors per session. For registration, please refer to the Information Desk at the Museum entrance on the same day. First-in first-served.
• Health protection measures: It is necessary to wear a mask (not provided by the Museum) and to use the whisper guide system headsets (provided by the Museum).
• Cost: The general admission fee to the Museum is required (10 euro).

Morning Saturday and Sunday gallery talks, "Marathon - Salamis. In traces of myth and history" and "Walking in the ancient neighbourhood of the Acropolis Museum" will be held as usual.

It’s been a difficult year for humanity, but together, we have the power to help each other get back on our feet. Οn August 25-29, 2021, the Stavros Niarchos Foundation's (SNF) SNF Nostos events that ordinarily take place each June at the Stavros Niarchos Foundation Cultural Center (SNFCC) in Athens, Greece, will give us a chance to get together, to start talking, and to get moving once again. We look forward to experiencing SNF Nostos in person this summer with all of you.

SNF Nostos is an international, multidimensional festival bursting with art, conversation and ideas, music, dance, performances, participatory entertainment, and sports activities. SNF Nostos combines a fresh lineup of beloved Greek and international artists with annual signature events: the SNF Nostos Conference featuring luminaries from diverse spheres, the evening SNF Nostos RUN, and the SNF DIALOGUES in collaboration with the SNF Agora Institute at Johns Hopkins University.

Discover

How can we make sure that artificial intelligence technology emboldens the human spirit, rather than diminishes it? How might we use AI to build a healthier, greener, and more equitable world? Can we limit the risks of AI, and ensure its benefits are widely shared? Can we use AI to overcome our limitations instead of simply reinforcing them?

The 2021 SNF Nostos Conference, dedicated to Humanity and Artificial Intelligence, will explore these questions and more from August 26 to August 28.

Register HERE!

Discuss

On August 25th, SNF DIALOGUES, a series of events held through journalism nonprofit iMEdD (incubator for Media Education and Development), will host an open discussion as part of SNF Nostos on the topic of Humanity-AI Symbiosis in collaboration with the SNF Agora Institute at Johns Hopkins University.

Guided by expert perspectives and driven by the audience’s curiosity, the DIALOGUES discussion will address the ethical, philosophical and social issues that arise from the use of developed AI systems in everyday life, and what the future holds for society and democracy. The event will feature a live discussion with an AI system, giving food for thought and setting the stage for further discussion, including a Q&A with young people at the end of the event.

Register HERE!

Run

It may be the most satisfying activity at the SNF Nostos celebration, and it’s certainly the sweatiest. On August 25th, the SNF Nostos Run returns with an opportunity to join other runners from all over Greece and around the world in shaking off those lockdown cobwebs. The run will be held in-person and will also include a virtual option. Organization of the race is supervised by the nonprofit Regeneration & Progress and medical supervision is provided by the First Orthopedic Clinic at the National and Kapodistrian University of Athens (NKUA).

Registration for the SNF Nostos Run opens on June 23rd.

Enjoy

Artists from Greece and around the globe will present original works and installations that help us appreciate and rethink the world around us, including the mesmerizing potential artificial intelligence holds for humanity. Games, puzzles, and computer science conundrums will ignite curiosity and stretch brains of all ages. Electrifying musical acts will get us on our feet and moving to the beat.

This is the established annual appointment of book lovers that this year started on September 3. With the exception of last year’s postponement due to the pandemic, the Zappeion Book Festival is the first autumn cultural festival for the capital. This year, it will last until September 19, 2021.

This year’s Festival tribute will focus on the 200 years since the Greek Revolution and will include related discussions, speeches, round tables and other events, in addition to the thousands of books that will be available to visitors. In fact, an interesting fact is that the poster and the cover of the catalog of the 49th event adorn one of the works of the important Greek painter Christos Antonaropoulos.

Monday-Thursday: 18: 00-22: 30

Friday & Saturday: 18: 00-23: 00

Be the first to see the Hellenic Air Force’s new state-of-the-art Rafale take to the Greek skies, performing gravity-defying manoeuvres! The French Demo Rafale will take off from Tanagra for an amazing display of its flight capabilities, and you’ll be impressed by its unique flexibility and the wonderful paint scheme prepared for this year’s air show by the French Air Force!

Athens Flying Week, the largest air show in Greece, returns on Saturday 4th and Sunday 5th of September more impressive than ever!!! Watch a “COMBAT EVAC” exercise by the Greek Armed Forces, demonstrations for the aircrafts of the Hellenic Air Force, the Army and the Navy but also the fire extinguishers Canadair CL-415 and PZL!

Don’t miss the unique spectacle organized by the Athens Flying Week team for the 200th anniversary of the Greek Revolution!

Aegean Airlines with the A320 NEO is also joining the Air Show and of course the 114th Combat Wing together with EAB who provide us with their hospitable facilities!

Get ready for the most impressive static exhibition ever!!! Do not miss the opportunity to take pictures with the French Rafale, the Tornado and the F-15s of the Royal Saudi Air Force, the Italian M-346, the C-130 from Belgium, the Austrian PC-7 and of course the Eurofighter Typhoon and the Tornado from Germany.

Get your ticket on time through viva.gr and its network of partners, from 15 euros for adults and 7.5 euros for minors. Due to COVID measures, the tickets are issued ONLY electronically while as every year there is a bus available to transport the spectators to and from the air base of Tanagra! See the detailed flight schedule with all international and Greek entries for Saturday 4th and Sunday 5th of September.

Ready for take off?

 

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XpatAthens is proud to be a Media Sponsor of Athens Flying Week 

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Motorsport enthusiasts… start your engines! As for the rest of us, while we wait for our lives to resume something approaching their former speed and spin, here’s some exhilarating news to stir up the dust. 

One of the rally world’s most legendary events – the Acropolis Rally of Gods – is set to return to the Greek capital this September, after an eight year absence.  

Since its debut in 1951, the Acropolis Rally has built a cult following and is considered one of the World Rally Championship’s most fearsome and glorious rounds. Twisty and rocky mountain roads conspire with the ancient Athenian dust and intense heat to provide rally drivers with a Herculean challenge - and many recognised drivers have found themselves humiliated in the attempt. 

There were some murmurs last year about this iconic gravel road rally revving up in Athens once again, but Greek Prime Minister Kyriakos Mitsotakis has now officially waved the flag to confirm that the competition has been added to the 2021 calendar of the FIA World Rally Championship (WRC), and a multi-year agreement reached. This year, Rally of Gods will form round 10 of the season from September 9 – 12, 2021, replacing the Copec Rally Chile, which was sidelined due to the pandemic.

The Acropolis Rally Greece will start from its traditional location beneath the Parthenon, restoring one of the sport’s most sought-after picture postcard images for rally fans across the world.

The Greek Prime Minister celebrated the WRC’s revival in Greece in a recorded message of support:

This content was originally published on This is Athens
Photo Credit: WRC Promoter

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Whether you’ve just arrived in town – or have been here for years – Athens always has new secrets to share! This is Athens is the official guide to this captivating city of ancient energies and booming urban culture. Compiled by a team of specialist local writers, This is Athens brings you an authentic and intimate portrait of a living Athens beyond the guidebooks – along with daily curated listings of all the best events and great weekend inspiration all-year round. From must-know neighbourhoods and emerging art hubs, to gourmet hotspots, cool shopping and the buzziest bars, This is Athens will help you to get the most out of living in Athens!

Thank you This is Athens for your contribution as an XpatAthens Partner.

Athens Street Food Festival is back! The festival, which became a gastronomic institution and a reference point for Athens, starts heating the ovens again!

On the 10-11-12, 17-18-19, and 24-25-26 of September, the Amaxostasio of OSY venue at Gazi will be filled with smells of the most delicious recipes of “street food” from around the world and with thousands of foodies who want to try them!

With over 400,000 visitors in four years, ASFF is the largest food festival in the country and a top cultural event for the whole of Athens.

For its 2021 edition, ASFF raises the bar, even more, presenting original ideas, “unknown” cuisines of the world, and many exclusives.

ASFF 2021 will be held in compliance with all the necessary conditions required by the conditions due to the pandemic

More information will be announced soon!

A Led Zeppelin concert celebration under the Acropolis!  Their greatest hits performed live with a rock band, symphony orchestra and three other astonishing singers from London’s West End! 

As part of their world tour and directly from London’s West End, with sold-out shows at the world-famous Palladium, "Led Zeppelin Symphonic" comes to Athens for two incomparable nights at the Herodium Theater, on Friday 10 and Saturday 11 September, at 9:00 p.m!

Three dynamic rock singers come together on stage with an unbeatable rock band accompanied by symphonic orchestration all under the direction of the famous conductor Richard Sidwell - the man behind "Queen Symphonic", the amazing global success that enchanted the Greek public, in 2 sold out performances at the Herodium Theater!

With all the regulations and measures in place to protect the health of spectators, it's time to revel again at an amazing concert under the Parthenon!!!

FokiaNou Art Space is pleased to present “Unfolding”, a two-person exhibition by Anastasia Denos and Grigoria Vryttia. The two artists present works that focus on bodies, spirits and materiality. Through different mediums and approaches they conjure both the universal forces and hyperpersonal narratives that flow through the body. Between Denos’ drawings, video/performance, and installation and Vryttia’s textile and found-object sculpture, they jointly evoke the realm between intuition and physicality.

Anastasia Denos is a Los Angeles based multi-media artist. She graduated from Hampshire College, Massachusetts in 2018 where she worked closely under Sara Greenberger Rafferty. Since then she’s been throwing her head against the wall of her Los Angeles studio. Using video performance, dance choreography, sculpture, drawing, and poetry, Denos is interested in the subconcious and the impressions it leaves on objects, architecture, and flesh. She has shown her work at Herter Gallery, Amherst; Non Plus Ultra and Beta Level, Los Angeles; and was chosen to participate in Hauser and Wirth’s online exhibition ‘Homegrown.’

Grigoria Vryttia is an interdisciplinary artist, currently based in Athens. She studied sculpture in the Department of Fine and Applied Arts, School of Fine Arts, Aristotelian University of Thessaloniki and subsequently got an M.F.A. at Wimbledon College of Art, London with a scholarship from the Michelis Foundation. Her work focuses on personal narratives, universality and subjectivity, with strong feminist references. With intuitive processes and fabric and found objects as the main mediums, she creates sculptures that balance between figuration and abstraction, concept and form. They often refer to ideas of childhood, loss, sexuality and death with cryptic references to lived experiences. Works of hers are in private collections internationally.

FokiaNou Art Space is an artist-run project space in the intimacy of a small apartment in an old building in the center of Athens. The space encourages collaborative creative efforts between Greek and foreign artists, thereby promoting and supporting the local art community. The space hosts exhibitions, workshops and projects under the direction of two artists, Mary Cox and Panagiotis Voulgaris. www.fokianou247.gr

Opening: Saturday 11 September, 18.00
Duration: 11-25 September 2021
Hours: Wednesday – Saturday 17.00-20.00