International Journal of Arts and Humanities (IJAH)

This article was written on the occasion of the acts of vandalism committed in Athens, in 2018, against a modern open-air sculpture named “Phylax”, the work of visual artist Kostis Georgiou. The sculpture had been erected in the late 2017 in an open-air space on the seafront of Athens. However, it caused intense reactions among extremist political and religious groups, which claimed that the sculpture “brought to mind” (sic) the figure of Satan. This brought to the forefront various other incidents of censorship of art in Greece which show that, in spite of living in the 21st century, some citizens continue to be driven by Dark Ages misconceptions and that it is not possible to eliminate, or at least limit, this phenomenon. There are many reasons behind the impulse of organised or non-organised groups of citizens to impose censorship. Generally, the reason put forward, in artistic and social life in Greece, has been that the works represented an “attack on the people’s national and religious beliefs” or an “attack on public decency”, in whose name there have been interventions in the freedom of expression. Historically, open-air sculpture has been considered in Greece the optimum means for expressing sentiments with a national or religious connotation. The criteria according to which this form of art is perceived have evolved depending on the era and the region, i.e. depending on time and place.