The Museum of Cycladic Art in Athens celebrated this week after picking up a “Youniversal” (aka “People’s Choice”) Award at the 2019 Global Fine Art Awards (GFAA) for its exhibition “Picasso and Antiquity. Line and Clay” that run from June to October 2019.

In a world first, the exhibition, curated by the museum’s director Prof. Nikos Stampolidis and Art Historian Olivier Berggruen, displayed 68 rare ceramics and sketches created by Pablo Picasso between 1920 and 1960 alongside 67 ancient Greek antiquities that had inspired him, creating a “divine dialogue“ between ancient Greek and modern art.

The exhibition’s 60,000 visitors were clearly left with the best of impressions, with the public ultimately voting it one of the best curated exhibitions in the world. In total the awards featured 99 nominees from 27 countries.

The other institutions the Cycladic Museum was up against in the category “Best Fringe / Alternative Exhibition” included the Solomon R. Guggenheim Museum in New York and the Van Gogh Museum in the Netherlands.

“This distinction is for everyone working hard at the museum,“ Prof. Stampolidis told Kathimerini journalist Margarita Pournara. “From the guard smiling at the visitors in the museum’s entrance, to the staff and the management working hard so that every one of our exhibitions is a one-of-a-kind experience for the visitor.

“What I also find rewarding is that this exhibition presented art as something continuous from antiquity to our days. It was a coming together of past and present, a constructive dialogue that shows what our country can achieve in the sphere of culture.“