NEW ACROPOLIS LIGHTING LAUNCH TODAY

New and improved Acropolis lighting is to be launched today – Wednesday, September 30, 2020 at 20:00 (UTC+2) – in the presence of the President of the Hellenic Republic Katerina Sakellaropoulou, the Prime Minister Kyriakos Mitsotakis, the Minister of Culture and Sports Lina Mendoni, and the President of the Onassis Foundation Anthony S. Papadimitriou. This is the first in a series of works being undertaken by the Hellenic Ministry of Culture and Sports to completely upgrade all facilities and services on the Acropolis, donated and delivered by the Onassis Foundation.

The new Acropolis lighting is to be streamed live on the Hellenic Ministry of Culture and Sports’ digitalculture.gov.gr website and the Onassis Foundation YouTube Channel, and broadcast live on Greek national television (ERT1).

The new lighting picks out the monuments of the Acropolis citadel from its fortification walls, and also illuminates the spaces between them for the first time. More specifically, nine landmarks have been completely re-lit: the Acropolis rock, the fortification walls, the Parthenon, the Propylaia, the Temple of Athena Nike, the Erechtheion, the Ancient Theater of Dionysos, the Stoa of Eumenes, and the Shrine of Dionysos Eleutherios. The lighting design also includes another five monuments lit for the first time – the Monument of Thrasyllos, the choragic columns, the Asklepieion, the Cave Sanctuaries of Apollo and Aglauros / Klepsydra, and the Shrine of Aphrodite.

The new lighting studies did not limit themselves to esthetics – the project also constitutes a major upgrade of the existing infrastructure, bringing the electric power system and automated lighting control systems right up to date. It highlights the Acropolis rock as a whole, the fortification walls, and the volumes and geometries of each monument from every possible viewpoint. The marbles – now whiter than ever before – reflect every facet, every geometric shape, and every natural material in order to accentuate each monument’s decorative reliefs.

In a statement, the Minister of Culture and Sports Lina Mendoni noted: “From the moment we took on our duties at the Ministry of Culture and Sports, our main concern has been the upgrading of all facilities and services on the Athenian Acropolis. The image of the Acropolis – our crowning monument – reflects and projects the image of our country. To our good fortune, the Onassis Foundation was interested in adopting this goal of ours, kindly offering to make the major funding contributions necessary to complete a series of works. Chief among them is the lighting of the Acropolis and its monuments, as well as the construction and installation of an elevator up its slopes – a pioneering and exceptionally complex project – in order to ensure access to the archeological site with the utmost safety, not just for disabled visitors but also for anyone facing difficulties when accessing the Acropolis and its monuments. In the midst of a pandemic, it is important for Athens to be able to offer its residents and visitors – indeed the whole world – a new and improved image of the Acropolis rock. The new lighting succeeds in highlighting the rock, its fortification walls, the Parthenon and other monuments, and their general setting too. It accentuates the third dimension through gradations of intensity and hue, and the new lighting fixtures are eco-friendly, offering significant energy savings. I am happy that joint action taken by the public and private sectors can, in a short space of time, deliver pioneering and exemplary works for our country that help improve Greece’s public image on the world stage.”

The President of the Onassis Foundation, Anthony S. Papadimitriou, noted: “When invited by the Greek state to assist in the redesign of the Acropolis lighting in Athens, it was the duty of all of us at the Onassis Foundation to rise to the occasion, to help shine a light on this intangible quintessence of history. Democracy as truth, human rights as values – these are things that ought to be lit symbolically. Today, more than ever, we as citizens need to see the world of the Parthenon anew – brighter, clearer, and more reassuring than ever. In these dark times, faced with a pandemic that threatens to close us in, light seems to be the most powerful symbol of all.”

The new lighting design gradates the tones and intensities of the whites between the inner and outer aspects of the monuments so as to accentuate the architectural elements, making their reliefs, depths, and plasticities more distinct. Light pollution has been reduced as part of the technical upgrade. All electrical switchboards have been changed, and the existing HID lights replaced with 609 cutting-edge, high color fidelity LED lighting fixtures (that’s 40% fewer than before), with a view to the new installation running without issue for over twenty years. The new lighting fixtures have minimal maintenance costs. The newly installed system delivers energy savings of more than 65%, and all the fixtures can be independently controlled at every level, offering significant flexibility for the creation of different lighting states. It is also worth noting that the cable installation has been improved across all the monuments, thereby also improving the esthetics of the site.

An open call made by the Onassis Foundation led to the selection of the internationally acclaimed, Emmy Award-winning lighting designer Eleftheria Deko to undertake the project studies and design. She notes: “In January 2020, the Onassis Foundation selected our proposals from among other reputable lighting design firms, commissioning us to light the Acropolis and its monuments. It supported our ideas from the first, and trusted us completely. The Hellenic Ministry of Culture and Sports and the Central Archeological Council both commended our new lighting proposals, which we presented following two months of intensive preparations, testing, and studies. Once our plans were unanimously approved by the Central Archeological Council, we entered the delivery phase, where the pandemic slowed the speed at which the project could be realized. Nevertheless, my colleagues and I never stopped working, not even for a day. Our days were spent drawing up plans, our nights were spent testing. 2D and 3D modelled designs, luminosity readings, calculations, test after test – all to achieve lighting that would make the Parthenon and every other monument on the Acropolis gleam bright, as they rightly deserve, in the heart of our city. Shining the light of our country’s culture all around, the world over. Now that this project is complete, I feel like I’ve been baptized for a second time. It was truly my baptism in our country’s culture.”

Watch a teaser video here: https://youtu.be/M0JwHVe_s5Y

You can live stream the event on Wednesday, September 30 at 20:00 (UTC+2), here:

digitalculture.gov.gr

Onassis Foundation YouTube Channel

Broadcast live on Greek national television (ERT1).