The creation of the Odysseus Elytis Museum in Plaka, which will house the valuable archival material and preserve the work of the Nobel Prize-winning poet, was sealed with a Memorandum of Cooperation, which was signed by the Minister of Culture and Sports Lina Mendoni and the President of the Board of Directors of the Urban Non-Profit Society “AERTON” Ioulita Iliopoulou.

The use of the building and the two auxiliary buildings, owned by the Ministry of the Interior, at the junction of Dioskouroi and Polygnotou streets, is granted to “AERTON”, after the completion of its restoration work, in the summer of 2023.

The YPPOA will subsidize the operation of the Museum and will provide specialized expertise and support in the operation of the space, which will be managed by “AERTON”.

The procedures for the creation of the space and the restoration of the building started in December 2020.

As the Minister of Culture and Sports Lina Mendoni stated, “From September 2019, our strategy is to highlight and attribute cultural uses to buildings – interesting examples of Athenian urban architecture – which prove the historical continuity of the capital, constituting poles of interest for visitors to the city of Athens. In this context, recognizing the great contribution of the leading Greek, Nobel laureate, we are creating the Odysseus Elytis Museum, which will house the work of the poet who bowed to the sources of Greekness, while at the same time he was the first to accept the revolutionary theories of the modern movement. The Elytis Museum in Plaka will give visitors the opportunity to come into contact with the poet’s aesthetics, austere life, and his perception of Art. The exact representation of his office, his workplace, the personal items that will be exhibited, the valuable archival and exhibition material, curated by Ioulita Iliopoulou, who reverently preserves the legacy of the great poet, will make the Elytis Museum, her ark his collective mythology and his national work».

Ioulita Iliopoulou noted “The fact of creating an exhibition and study space for Odysseus Elytis is particularly important and moving for me. A house that will house something from the material part of his life, something from the aesthetics and frugality that he represented. I thank the Minister of Culture Lina Mendoni for her decision to realize an idea that had been pending for years. I hope it will be beneficial for everyone».

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The work of Odysseus Elytis, poetry and prose, his visual works, the many musical compositions, the even more translations, but also the values ​​of universal importance projected through his texts, make it imperative to systematically promote, but also to properly preserve a important part of the personal file.

Spaces are planned in the building for the exhibition, but also for the storage of the Elytis Archive, as well as for the important visual material, which showcases his varied work. At the same time, through photos, texts, audio and visual material, the life of the Poet is presented in relief.

The Elytis Archive is and remains in the possession of Ioulita Iliopoulou, who also initiated the proposal to the Ministry of Culture in 2013.