The relationship between art, design, and travel continues to evolve as exhibitions increasingly move beyond the traditional gallery format. Across Southern Europe, historic residences, villas, and heritage buildings are becoming immersive cultural spaces where visitors experience art within authentic architectural settings rather than conventional white walls. According to UN Tourism, cultural tourism remains one of the fastest-growing segments of international travel, with travellers increasingly choosing destinations that combine artistic discovery with local heritage and craftsmanship. As audiences seek more meaningful cultural experiences, exhibitions are becoming environments that invite visitors to slow down, observe, and engage with the places they visit.
“Art enables us to find ourselves and lose ourselves at the same time,” wrote Thomas Merton. His words continue to resonate because the strongest exhibitions rarely depend solely on the works they present. Instead, they create an atmosphere where architecture, objects, history, and human interaction become part of the same experience. Increasingly, curators are moving away from formal presentation and towards installations that feel personal, intimate, and deeply connected to their surroundings, allowing visitors to experience art as part of everyday life.
This idea lies at the centre of A Summer in Hydra, the latest exhibition curated by Leslie Kabla. Bringing together designers, ceramicists, painters, sculptors, and artisans whose work shares a close relationship with Greece, its landscapes, and its centuries-old craftsmanship, the exhibition occupies the historic Melina Mercouri building overlooking Hydra’s harbour, just a short walk from the DESTE Foundation. Rather than creating a traditional exhibition, Leslie Kabla has transformed the historic stone house into a Mediterranean residence where every room tells its own story. What if an exhibition felt less like entering a gallery and more like being welcomed into someone’s home?
Throughout the installation, visitors move naturally from one domestic setting to another. A living room, dining space, reading corner, and music salon unfold one after another, creating the impression that the house has been inhabited for generations. Nothing appears staged or overly arranged. Furniture, paintings, ceramics, textiles, handcrafted objects, and carefully selected vintage pieces coexist with remarkable ease, encouraging visitors to experience the collection as part of daily life rather than isolated works displayed for observation alone.
Facing the sea, a grand piano becomes one of the exhibition’s defining focal points. Around it, carefully composed interiors evoke the rhythm of a Greek island day. One space suggests an afternoon spent playing backgammon with friends, another recalls an intimate piano recital, while elsewhere a dining table appears ready to welcome guests gathering over local food and wine as the afternoon slowly turns into evening. The exhibition celebrates the quiet rituals that define Mediterranean life, allowing ordinary moments to become part of the artistic narrative.
Hydra itself provides the conceptual foundation for the project. The island has long been admired for its preserved stone houses, narrow streets, maritime history, and enduring artisan traditions. Inspired by these architectural and cultural references, A Summer in Hydra reflects the understated beauty for which the island has become known. Simplicity and craftsmanship remain central throughout, allowing natural materials, handmade objects, and carefully balanced interiors to speak with quiet confidence.
For Leslie Kabla, the exhibition represents the next chapter in an ongoing exploration of Mediterranean living. Following A House in Saint-Tropez, which interpreted the atmosphere of a private residence on the French Riviera through contemporary design, the focus now shifts towards Greece. While each project explores a different destination, both share a common ambition: to demonstrate how art, design, architecture, and craftsmanship naturally shape everyday life within the Mediterranean.
The exhibition brings together an international group of contemporary artists and designers, including Leda Athanasopoulou, Elina Belou, Daphne Leon, Lina Zedig, Jeanne Chardin, Claudio Coltorti, Leonie Specht, and Romain Cadhilon, alongside works created by Greek artisans and a carefully curated selection of vintage pieces. Each contribution reflects an individual creative language while participating in a broader conversation inspired by the island’s cultural identity.
Visitors also have the opportunity to acquire many of the works presented throughout the exhibition. Furniture, ceramics, handcrafted objects, limited editions, and decorative pieces remain available for purchase during the exhibition, with the collection continuing afterwards through Leslie Kabla’s forthcoming online platform, LK Shop. The digital gallery will extend the concept beyond Hydra while introducing future exhibitions within the same curatorial series.
Rather than separating art from everyday life, A Summer in Hydra proposes another way of experiencing creativity. Here, paintings accompany conversations, ceramics belong naturally on dining tables, furniture invites visitors to sit and pause, and architecture frames every encounter with the sea. Through this carefully considered environment, Leslie Kabla presents an exhibition where Mediterranean culture is experienced not only through individual works of art, but through the atmosphere they create together within a home overlooking one of Greece’s most celebrated harbours.
Crédit photo : © Joseph Alexiadis
