About
Dakis Joannou, civil engineer and architect by training, was born in Nicosia, Cyprus on December 30, He received his Bachelor’s degree in Civil Engineering from Cornell University in , his Master’s from Columbia University in and a Doctorate in Architecture from the Sapienza University of Rome, Italy, in
Dakis Joannou’s core business is civil engineering and construction. He heads J&P, a group of privately held international building, civil engineering and energy companies with activities in the Middle East, North Africa and Southeastern Europe. He is also active in the hospitality sector, with holdings in the Inter-Continental Hotel in Athens and through Yes! Hotels, a chain of small hotels whose flagships are the Semiramis Hotel, designed by Karim Rashid, and the NEW Hotel, designed by Humberto and Fernando Campana. Joannou is furthermore involved in a wide range of other entrepreneurial activities holding directorships in several companies.
Dakis Joannou is a major collector of European and American contemporary art and the founder of the DESTE Foundation for Contemporary Art which was established in Geneva in Works from his collection have been presented in sever
At the apex of Greece’s financial crisis, c’s Thom Bettridge travelled to Athens and Hydra to visit Dakis Joannou, an industrialist and hotel magnate famed for his contemporary art collection.
Much like his yacht Guilty, Joannou is a surreal, unapologetic, and larger-than-life figure. In a turbulent year of capital controls and austerity sanctions, Joannou’s endeavor proved to exist in its own sovereign universe. During , his DESTE Art Foundation hosted more exhibitions than any other in its history. Joannou’s collection tells the story of a year-long infatuation with art that has spun out into a network of objects and friendships. “It’s about changing ideas,” the collector says regarding the public impact of his work. While he has been credited with pulling the art world’s attention to Athens, Joannou insists that the social benefit of his foundation is “collateral.” But what larger project – or desire – this benefit is collateral of remains a mystery.
Paul Chan, Hippias Minor,
“If a visitor knows he’s going to be lied to, then he is forced to challenge the authority of what he sees,” the docent said. The sun was beginning to turn pink as a small group of us sat on
Dakis Joannou
Turning Art on its Head
In an often-told story in the art world, Joannou founded the DESTE Foundation for Contemporary Art in the Athenian suburb of Nea Ionia in , but his collection truly began when he purchased his first piece, a basketball that appears to float in mid-air by Jeff Koons. Today, Joannou’s collection has grown to approximately 1, pieces, including works by Maurizio Cattelan, Jenny Holzer, Kaari Upson, Ashley Bickerton, and many by Koons, now a close friend. Each summer, the foundation installs a unique, site-specific exhibition inside a former slaughterhouse on the Greek island of Hydra as DESTE Project Space Slaughterhouse.
Naturally, this robust collection makes its way inside his hotels, too. Joannou is the founder of the bold, boundary-pushing DONKEY Hotels & Resorts group, which includes Periscope, New Hotel, and Semiramis in Athens, as well as Noūs Santorini on the Cycladic island. We sat down with Joannou to discuss his philosophy on collecting, his unique approach to hospitality, and what he hopes to accomplish yet.
Jeff Koons and Top collector Dakis Joannou go back a long way. The Greek Cypriot industrialist’s first art purchase was a Koons piece—a “Equilibrium Tank,” a basketball seeming to float mid-air. Today, Jouannou still considers it to be his most prized possession. Later on, Jouannou invited Koons to design his foot-long yacht, Guilty, and to do the annual project at the collector’s Deste Foundation Project Space on the Greek island of Hydra in
Dakis Joannou created his Deste Foundation for Contemporary Art in in Nea Ionia, a northern suburb of Athens. Joannou’s Mediterranean retreat hosts an annual exhibition, and in , it staged a showcase of work by New York–based artist Kiki Smith. The exhibit has become an event of its own for trotting out some of the art world’s most important denizens; Artsy reported that a bathing suit–clad Frank Moore was spotted beside dealer Mike Egan, of the New York gallery Ramiken Crucible, while Whitney Museum director Adam Weinberg and Jeffrey Deitch relaxed nearby. If you can afford the cost of getting to the sunny Greek locale, exhibits at Hydra are free to any visitors to the island.
Joannou has told ARTnews that the foundation is the b
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