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In Athens, Works from George Economou’s Art Collection Take Stock of the 21st Century

Curated by Hilton Als and Ann Philbin, "The Way We Live Now" gathers works from the billionaire's collection to examine humanity's condition through the lenses of connection, politics and being.

Greek industrialist and art collector George Economou built a fortune in commercial shipping before channeling part of that wealth into one of Athens’s most substantial private art collections. Notably, he did not come from one of Greece’s established shipping dynasties: his father owned a small paper-products company, and he is probably as close as a billionaire can come to being self-made. He studied at MIT, earning degrees in naval architecture, marine engineering and shipping management, then worked for shipping companies before buying his first vessel in the mid-1980s. In the ’90s, Economou began collecting art, initially focusing on early 20th-century European works before expanding into Postwar and contemporary pieces.

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Not long after the art world embarked on its post-Basel Greek sojourn, “The Way We Live Now” opened, offering a rare opportunity to see works from what is arguably one of Europe’s most significant private collections interpreted through a literary and social lens. Co-curated by Pulitzer Prize-winning writer Hilton Als and Ann Philbin, director emeritus of the Hammer Museum, the exhibition of pieces from Economou’s collection invites viewers to contemplate the world we live in now through three lenses: Intimacy, Politics and Being.

Over three floors of the collection’s headquarters in the Athens suburb of Marousi, “The Way We Live Now” begins with a sentimental reflection on how emotions shape an artist’s understanding of the surrounding world. David Hockney’s portrait of Peter Schlesinger becomes an image of love observed in silence, while Ellen Gallagher’s Fast Fish and Loose Fish introduces a more unstable and disruptive energy. David Hammons’s Rock Head asks the viewer to supply the psychology of a human figure through an ordinary stone.

"The Way We Live Now" Artists: Various Venue: The George Economou Collection Address: 80 Kifissias Ave. 151 25 Marousi, Athens Through: March 2027

In Politics, the exhibition considers how our individual bodies move vulnerably through a world framed by politics. Louise Bourgeois’s arrangement of two chairs and a mirror asks whether identity is self-defined or produced through the reflections of others. Around it, Henry Taylor’s portrait of Haile Selassie examines political leadership, iconography and........

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