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For the second year in a row, the Greek organization NEON collaborates with the Hellenic Parliament to bring to life the iconic building of the former Public Tobacco Factory in Athens and present 'Dream On,' a contemporary art exhibition celebrating art in public space. The project, curated by Dimitris Paleocrassas, brings together a number of large-scale works from the D.Daskalopoulos Collection, including John Bock's sculptural tentacle installation that sprawls out of a beautifully restored Lincoln convertible. Paul McCarthy's Tomato-Head sculpture, Thomas Hirschhorn's cave made of tape, cardboard, books, posters, and cans, and Damien Hirst's Greetings from the Gutter made of colorful gas cylinders are among the other works on display.
The artworks will be donated to four museums in three countries and two continents, including the Greek National Museum of Contemporary Art (EMST), Tate, and the Solomon R. Guggenheim Museum and the Museum of Contemporary Art Chicago.
This is the first time in Greece that such a large number of large-scale works from the D.Daskalopoulos Collection have been gathered in the public area of the former Public Tobacco Factory. 'Dream On,' says curator Dimitris Paleocrassas, is permeated by a sense of abundance brought about by the realization of a great dream: an artist's grand but elusive goal, achieved through the unrestrained creativity of large-scale installations. Similarly, the D.Daskalopoulos Collection Gift realizes the owner's dream: a private collection transformed into a public good that will be preserved for future generations of audience and artists. Dream On includes work by John Bock, Helen Chadwick, Abraham Cruzvillegas, Martha Dimitropoulou, Peter Fischli & David Weiss, David Hammons, Thomas Hirschhorn, Damien Hirst, Michael Landy, Maria Loizidou, Paul McCarthy, Annette Messager, Maro Michalakakos, Wangechi Mutu, Paul Pfeiffer, Alexandros Psychoulis, Matthew Ritchie, and Anna-Maria Samara.
NEON also commissions Kostas Ioannidis to create a large-scale audio work delivered in whistling language. Along with the installations, there are 20 artist drawings of some of the works before they were created.
Jean Dubreil 
