Weak Works | The Architecture of Christos Papoulias and His Friends

Papoulias wanted to put a museum inside the Acropolis. Not beside it: in an old excavation pit in the rock, against an early Mycenaean wall, lit from above through the ground next to the Parthenon. He called it the Crypt, never even entered it in the competition, and the Centre Pompidou bought the drawings.

This show spreads his archive, kept in Anafiotika until his death in 2024, across two floors of the foundation: drawings, models, photographs, clippings and diary-like notes from the 1980s into the 2000s. You move through houses, unbuilt museums and small surgical changes to existing buildings, with works by friends such as Jannis Kounellis and Brice Marden alongside. Next time you stand on the Acropolis Museum's glass floor, remember someone wanted the whole thing inside the rock.

The curators call it a workshop rather than a conventional architecture show, so expect reading and close looking. Tickets are €10 (€5 reduced), daily 10:00 to 18:00 and Thursdays until 20:00.