All you need to watch, see, do this June

Get inspired this month by visiting an ecclectic art exhibit or witnessing thespian talents, indulging in melodic performances or exploring the country through photographs. Insider rounds up the best events to beat the heat this June, so mark your calendars!

Festivals

Made In Beer Festival

WHAT: Three cheers for beer at this merry three-day festival that celebrates the recent creative explosion in Greece’s beer industry. Make the acquaintance of dozens of domestic and foreign brewers whose products are not distributed in Greece at great prices, sample fresh beer brewed exclusively for the festival, and visit the largest Beer Bar built in this country, along with a hale and hearty line-up of live entertainment.

For more details visit HERE.

WHEN: June 1-3

WHERE: O.S.Y.

Athens Technopolis Festival

WHAT: Greece’s biggest Jazz Festival turns 18 this year with a week-long celebration of smooth sounds, international acts and infectious spirits.

Boasting attendance records of up to 30,000 over the past couple of years, the Athens Technopolis Jazz Festival returns again this summer for its 18th year of jazz promotion. In 2017, the event hosted 17 jazz groups, more than 150 individual musicians and three bands. The festival usually attracts groups from all over the world like Israel, Estonia and Azerbaijan, but the first day this year will be reserved exclusively for Greek groups. With the purpose of promoting the genre of jazz among young Greeks, the event is 100% free. There will also be a strong jazz contingent from the United States in 2018, cementing the event’s international status. #JazzBeThere! The Festival will open this year with Athens Big Band and Momo Trio, a banging ensemble selected to represent Greece, followed by the Mario Laginha Trio from Portugal.

WHEN: June 4-10

WHERE: Technopolis

Athens Festival 2018

WHAT: The annual Athens Epidaurus Festival kicks off its 2018 as one of Europe’s oldest performing arts festivals.

While the modern Athens metropolis continues to shape-shift and evolve like a living, breathing entity, the voracious Athenian appetite for cultural symposia remains an unbreakable connection between ancient and present times. Each summer, the Athens Festival serves as a prism to celebrate the great scope and timbre of this artistic compulsion – and this year’s line-up is no exception. From timeless Greek icons to titans of Hollywood, Grammy award-winning pop stars and thought-provoking cinema, we single out some of the festival’s most unmissable highlights.

WHEN: From May

WHERE: Varying locations

Ellink0Theatro’s ATHENS2018 Festival

WHAT: New York’s EllinikoTheatro returns to Greece with the international performing arts festival ATHENS2018.

This summer, EllinikoTheatro will showcase international productions, including Rent Control, Cavafy: Poet of the City and Water Wings, documentaries and shorts, American literature, and a series of interdisciplinary masterclasses by international artists during ATHENS2018, a festival designed to bring together international performers and different cultures.

WHEN: June 18-July 3

WHERE: Theatre 104

Exhibitions

Joan Leigh Fermor: Artist and Lover

WHAT: The Benaki Museum pays tribute to the work and life of photographer Joan Leigh Fermor.

United by art, Joan and Paddy Leigh Fermor found love in Greece. As they traveled across the country, Joan Leigh Fermor photographed the people and places she discovered before settling with her husband in a Peloponnesian home, a house later entrusted to the Benaki Museum. The exhibition, “Joan Leigh Fermor: Artist and Lover”, takes visitors on a photographic journey through the lives of the Fermors.

For more details, visit HERE.

WHEN: From May 23

WHERE: Benaki Museum

Konstantin Kakanias at Rebecca Camhi Gallery

WHAT: Rebecca Camhi Gallery will honor contemporary artist Konstantin Kakanias with his sixth solo exhibition.

Konstantin Kakanias’ illustrations have appeared in publications such as The New York Times and the Los Angeles Times, and galleries across Europe and the United States have showcased his work. Rebecca Camhi Callery will host the next solo exhibition for the artist, who is known for his illustration, Mrs. Tependris, an eccentric character on a journey of self-discovery. Kakanias will attend the opening.

WHEN: From June 5

WHERE: Rebecca Camhi Gallery

George Condo at the Cycladic

WHAT: Encounter the fractured portraits and aggressive imagery that have made George Condo one of the most vital figurative sculptors in America at his first major solo exhibition in Greece.

The showcase will include paintings, sculptures and drawings spanning his 40-year career, with a catalogue to be published on to mark the occasion. In the 19080s, Condo – who has described his work as “psychological Cubism” – was instrumental in reviving figuration in American art, together with Jean-Michel Basquiat and Keith Haring, and Jeff Koons. Condo’s work is in the permanent collections of (among others): The Metropolitan Museum of Art, New York; The Museum of Modern Art, New York; The Solomon R. Guggenheim Museum, New York; Citigroup Art Advisory Service Collection, New York; The Broad Collection, Los Angeles; Tate Gallery, London; Centre Georges Pompidou, Paris; Deste Foundation for Contemporary Arts, Athens; Moderna Museet, Stockholm; Stedelijk Museum, Amsterdam.

WHEN: June 8-October

WHERE: Museum of Cycladic Art

Costas Varotsos: The Sculpture Poet

WHAT: See the cutting edge steel and glass creations of the globally-hailed sculptor, Costas Varotsos, best known for his Athenian landmark ‘The Runner’. Curated by Takis Mavrotas, “Costas Varotsos: The Sculpture Poet”  showcases new work by the acclaimed artist whose emblematic pieces have now taken root all over Europe and America.

WHEN: From June 20-October 21.

WHERE:  B&M Theocharakis Foundation

Concerts

Sting at Herodion Atticus

WHAT: One of the year’s hottest tickets as rock legend Sting performs live at the historic Odeon of Herodes to open this year’s Athens and Epidaurus Festival.

The Newcastle-born singer-songwriter and activist last performed at the venue in May 1996 during his “Mercury Falling” tour and is among the rare few acts granted permission to play at Athens’ most sacred arena at the foot of the Acropolis (others have included Elton John, Frank Sinatra and the Foo Fighters). At a venue of unique acoustic and historical significance, this world-renowned artist will give two concerts to the Greek audience over two evenings that will be remembered for a long time!” As one of the world’s most distinctive solo artists, Sting has received an additional 10 Grammy Awards, two Brits, a Golden Globe, an Emmy, four Oscar nominations, a TONY nomination and Billboard Magazine’s Century Award.  He was inducted into The Rock and Roll Hall of Fame in 2003.

Visit www.sting.com or www.tickethouse.gr for details.

WHEN: June 22 and June 23 at 7 pm.

WHERE: Odeon of Herodes Atticus

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