EXPO CHICAGO 2023 - National Hellenic Museum

The National Hellenic Museum will be closed to the public from 10:00 AM to 1:30 PM on Friday, June 16 due to a private event.

The National Hellenic Museum (NHM) is proud to present new works by HRH Prince Nikolaos at this year’s EXPO CHICAGO international art fair, April 13-16, 2023 at Navy Pier’s Festival Hall, 600 E. Grand Avenue in Chicago. The exhibition marks NHM’s EXPO CHICAGO debut.

Prince Nikolaos will exhibit a collection of photographs printed on Greek marble, combining the beauty of antiquity with the modernity of digital printing in a new method uniquely his own. The works are in black and white, so that the clarity of the natural marble comes through unadulterated and only the black hues of the images are printed.

“Prince Nikolaos weaves a complex story through his artistic process, often merging subject and medium. Here he achieves this by printing images of Greece directly onto Greek ‘earth,’ specifically on the crisp white marble of Thasos,” says curator Marilena Koutsoukou. “This method is unique to the artist, taking photography and the printing process one step further. It has enabled him to combine the Greek natural element and the beauty of antiquity with the modernity and directness of digital printing. He harnesses the strength of the material, uses its flaws and elevates them, rather than hiding them under the image printed. He allows us to see the perennial beauty of marble through his lens, making it both a surface as well as a theme itself.”

Prince Nikolaos’ North American exhibition debut, Resilience, is currently on display at the National Hellenic Museum through Saturday, April 15. This striking collection of 19 new works explores Greece’s enduring relationship with nature and the importance of environmental preservation. Among the features works is the North American premiere of Together, an immersive scene of life-size illuminated, embracing olive trees accompanied by sounds of Greek nature, which first premiered at the London Design Biennale in 2021.

Resilience is generously sponsored by the John S. Koudounis Family and curated by Marilena Koutsoukou. For more information, visit nationalhellenicmuseum.org/resilience.

BIOGRAPHY

HRH PRINCE NIKOLAOS
HRH Prince Nikolaos was born on 1 October 1969, in Rome, Italy. His parents, TM King Constantine and Queen Anne- Marie, had moved there in 1967. In 1975 the family settled in London, where Prince Nikolaos was home educated for six years. He then attended the Hellenic College of London. In 1988 he began his studies in international relations at Brown University in Providence, Rhode Island, focusing on Diplomacy and National Security. During his sophomore year, he took a sabbatical to join the British Army on a Short Service Limited Commission, serving as 2nd Lieutenant with the Royal Scots Dragoon Guards. Upon his college graduation (1993), Prince Nikolaos moved into TV production for Fox News in New York. He returned to London in 1995 to work in the foreign exchange options department of NatWest Markets. From 1997 to 2003 he worked in King Constantine’s Family Office. Since then he has been active in business consulting. An avid photographer for all his life, Prince Nikolaos has passionately dedicated himself to photography since 2013. In November 2015 he exhibited his work for the first time at Christie’s in London. In March 2016 his photography was featured at The New York Times ‘Art for Tomorrow’ conference in Doha, Qatar. A selection of his photographs were also published in the book ‘A Taste of Greece’, published by teNeues. In June 2018, Prince Nikolaos had his first solo museum exhibition, titled ‘Phos: A Journey of Light’, at the Hellenic Museum in Melbourne, Australia. The artist was then commissioned by LA Organic, to produce a work, after the recommendation of Philippe Starck studio, which is currently exhibited at La Almazara, Spain.

In November 2018, the artist was invited by Sotheby’s Jewelry to show 10 photographs from his series ‘Phos’ to a select audience. Sotheby’s experts have dubbed prince Nikolaos’ photographs ‘Jewels from Greece’. In March of 2019, his collection titled ‘Celestial Choreography’, was exhibited in Rundetaarn, one of the most iconic buildings of Copenhagen, to great critical acclaim. In October and November of the same year, his dual exhibition ‘Aegean Desert’ opened up in Athens, Greece and Doha, Qatar, respectively. The exhibition, pairing images from the sea with images of the desert presented within site-specific art installations, was the first institutional collaboration between Benaki Museum of Islamic Art in Athens and Katara – Cultural Village Foundation in Doha.

In June of last year, Prince Nikolaos exhibited his work ‘Together’ at the London Design Biennale 2021. There, he presented an enchanted, immersive scene of illuminated, life-sized olive trees reflected in mirrors and surrounded by sounds of Greek nature.

His current exhibition ‘Resilience’ opened in Chicago on September 16, 2022, marking the reopening of the National Hellenic Museum, after a 2-year closure. In this exhibition, the artist presents works that revolve around the themes of water, olive oil and wine, being loosely based on the famous adage of Odysseas Elytis: ‘If you deconstruct Greece, you will in the end see an olive tree, a grapevine, and a boat remain. That is, with as much, you reconstruct her’. HRH Prince Nikolaos sits on the Board of Knightsbridge Schools International, established in 2008 to develop and operate a network of international schools around the world. He is an active member and Advisor to the Board of Axion Hellas, a Greek non-profit volunteer organization supporting local communities in remote parts of the country. Prince Nikolaos and his wife Princess Tatiana (née Tatiana Blatnik) married in 2010. Three years later, they moved to Athens, Greece, where they currently reside.
HRH
PRINCE NIKOLAOS
THE PHOTOGRAPHER
WHO TAMED MARBLE
Marble has always been a beloved material, from antiquity until today, preferred for its uniqueness, its strength, its purity. Also preferred because of how expensive and heavy it is to work with, and how unforgiving it is even to the tiniest mistake.

Every artist throughout history has wanted to push boundaries in their work. Building on his natural talent, Prince Nikolaos weaves a complex story through his artistic process, often merging subject and medium. He achieves this by printing images of Greece directly onto Greek ‘earth’, specifically on the crisp white marble of Thasos. This method, unique to the artist, who takes photography and the printing process one step further, has enabled him to combine the Greek natural element and the beauty of antiquity, with the modernity and directness of digital printing.

He harnesses the strength of the material, uses its flaws, and elevates them, rather than hiding them under the image printed. He allows us to see the perennial beauty of marble through his lens, making it both a surface as well as a theme itself. He chooses to create black and white works, so that the whiteness of the marble can come through unadulterated, and only the black hues of the work are being printed.

At EXPO CHICAGO, Prince Nikolaos presents 10 marble works, and one marble-top coffee table. Discovering new processes and using marble as a canvas, he is expanding into design which has always interested him and something he explored when he designed the Greek Pavilion at the London Design Biennale 2021, to great acclaim.
The National Hellenic Museum is proud to present Prince Nikolaos at EXPO CHICAGO. The Prince’s North American exhibition debut, Resilience, is currently on display at the National Hellenic Museum (333 S. Halsted Street in Chicago) through Saturday, April 15. The museum is the premier U.S. institution dedicated to sharing Greek history, art and culture, from ancient times to the present day, including the modern Greek American experience. In addition to ongoing exhibitions and special events, the National Hellenic Museum has an extensive collection of more than 10,000 physical artifacts and hundreds of oral histories. Regular museum hours are ThursdaySunday from 10 a.m.-4 p.m. For more information, visit nationalhellenicmuseum.org or call 312-655-1234.

Marilena Koutsoukou | Curator

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