Onassis Stegi presents, in collaboration with Eye Filmmuseum, Amsterdam, Tilda Swinton’s exhibition Ongoing. Tilda Swinton, an iconic, daring performer and subversivevisual artist, takes center stage in this personal exhibition that brings together new and past works by eight of her close artistic collaborators and friends: Pedro Almodóvar, Luca Guadagnino, Joanna Hogg, Derek Jarman, Jim Jarmusch, Olivier Saillard, Tim Walker, and Apichatpong Weerasethakul. Films, photographs, installations, personal items, sculpture, performance, open-air cinema, and a masterclass.
A magical world for a phenomenal artistic figure. For the first time in Athens, an exhibition dedicated to the great performer and artist Tilda Swinton celebrates art, life, and her ongoing friendships, bringing this year’s Onassis Stegi theme—that of family, both the one we’re born into and the one we choose—to a luminous close. Performer, visual artist, and fashion icon Tilda Swinton meets her longtime artistic collaborators and friends in the singular, deeply personal exhibition Ongoing at Onassis Ready, the Onassis Foundation’s new arts space in Athens, from May 17 to June 28.
Nature, memories—and the very essence of memory—ancestors and spirits, friendships and artistic collaborations, as well as the liminal space of creation, lie at the core of Tilda Swinton’s work—the mess he continually explores alongside her creative partners. In the exhibition Ongoing, these concepts are approached through a wide range of expressive media. Her remarkable trajectory unfolds across eight sections ,each centered on one ofher closest collaborators.
Director Luca Guadagnino has created an intimate new portrait of her in the form of a short film and a sculptural work. With re-edited footage, a new score, Jim Jarmusch transforms scenes from his surreal zombie film, The Dead Don’t Die (2019), into an entirely new installation. Photographer Tim Walker visited Swinton at her family home for a portrait series exploring lineage and the continuity of the place. Director Apichatpong Weerasethakul has created a meditative, immersive installation, a deeply personal two-channel work that delves into themes he and Swinton have explored together for years, such as liminal states between wakefulness, creation, and sleep. Pedro Almodóvar presents the short film The Human Voice (2020) for the first time as an installation. With her childhood friend and filmmaker Joanna Hogg, Swinton unveils Flat 19, a multimedia reconstruction of her London apartment in the 1980s and an exploration of memory, space, and personal history.
Between May 16 and 19, together with acclaimed fashion historian and curator Olivier Saillard, Swinton presents the live performance A Biographical Wardrobe that brings to life a unique wardrobe, featuring garments from her personal collection, film costumes, red-carpet looks, and family heirlooms, in a confessional performance, in which she shares the story of her life through her clothing collection.
Finally, in this exhibition, Swinton pays tribute to one of her greatest influences, director Derek Jarman (1942–1994), with whom she collaborated on seven feature films. This section, enriched with material from Swinton’s archive, includes a large-screen installation featuring scenes from the film The Last of England (1987), as well as a special installation of previously unreleased Super 8 footage from Derek Jarman’s personal archive.
Tilda Swinton comments: “With the honor of this extraordinary invitation, I have had the opportunity to reflect on the mechanics of my working practice over the past forty years. And to come to rest on the—ever-present—bedrock and battery of the close fellowships I found from the very first and continue to rely upon to this day. In focusing attention on profoundly enriching creative relationships in my life, we share the narratives and atmospheres that inspire us: we offer new work, especially commissioned for this exhibition, as the most recent gestures born out of various companionable conversations that keep me curious, engaged, and nourished. An ongoing—and unbroken—thread of breadcrumbs through the wood, new leaves on long-established trees. The perpetual seedbed. I should be so lucky, in the gift of such an invitation, in such friends, and in such a life.”
Swinton emphasizes that every creative project is the product of a collaborative endeavor. She invites us to consider what it means to create art and film as part of a continuous conversation, in an exchange nurtured by trust, where roles blur, and ideas evolve collectively. This philosophy was already manifest in Swinton’s earliest cinematic expressions, particularly her work with Derek Jarman. As time has passed, she has forged new friendships, and new projects have evolved. Pedro Almodóvar, Luca Guadagnino, Joanna Hogg, Jim Jarmusch, Olivier Saillard, Tim Walker, and Apichatpong Weerasethakul are cherished partners with whom Swinton has built close, enriching, and ongoing artistic fellowships over the years. In Ongoing, these filmmakers and artists offer insights into the relationships that helped shape Swinton’s public contribution. Ongoing showcases works born out of friendship, creative impetus, and political urgency. It is precisely from intimate knowledge of each other’s backgrounds, visions, and inspirations that extraordinary projects across cinema, art, and fashion arise. The fruits of these exchanges are presented here in their most recent incarnations. Each of these collaborations is unique, characterized by lively creative exchange, openness, curiosity, and complexity. They reinterpret cinema as a space not only for storytelling but also for exploration, experimentation, and grieving—as a site for artistic exchange, reflection, and protest. Over time, these connections have deepened and grown in number. As such, this exhibition is not a retrospective, but a moment of gathering, of celebration—and a gesture of faith in the future. An opportunity to take stock and reflect. Because this is not a finale, but a milestone in an unfolding journey of curiosity and fellowship: Tilda Swinton – Ongoing.
Every Friday during the exhibition, a screening program with a feature and a short film will take place at an open-air cinema on the rooftop of Onassis Ready, celebrating each of the artists who collaborate with Tilda Swinton in Ongoing. Feature films include Caravaggio by Derek Jarman (1986), Io sono l’amore [I Am Love] by Luca Guadagnino (2009), Memoria by Apichatpong Weerasethakul (2021), The Room Next Door by Pedro Almodóvar (2024), The Eternal Daughter by Joanna Hogg (2022), and Only Lovers Left Alive by Jim Jarmusch (2013), while the shorts have been curated by Swinton from the Eye collection and from her own work.
On May 19, the iconic artist invites audiences into an intimate and open exploration of creative life: a masterclass titled “Fellowship, Art, & Nature,” which reflects on the networks of kinship—artistic, emotional, and chosen—that shape an artist’s practice over time.
At the exhibition Tilda Swinton – Ongoing, visitors will also discover a curated selection of publications on Swinton’s work, alongside a range of items inspired by her personality. At the specially designed shop within the exhibition space, they can choose from the official exhibition catalogue—created in close collaboration with graphic designer Irma Boom and published by Eye Filmmuseum and Rizzoli in collaboration with Hannibal Books—to tote bags, cards, notebooks, stickers, and publications by the Onassis Foundation.
Eye Filmmuseum Credits
Curators: Tilda Swinton, Vincent van Velsen
Coordinator of Exhibitions: Marente Bloemheuvel
Executive Producer and Project Manager: Julia Kozakiewicz
Project Manager: Reinier Klok
Production new works: Julia Kozakiewicz, Pinky Ghundale
Exhibition Design: Claus Wiersma
Films, Talks & Events: Julian Ross, Anna Abrahams, Mila Schlingemann
Onassis Stegi Credits
Artistic Director: Afroditi Panagiotakou
Executive Director: Dimitris Theodoropoulos
Curators: Iliana Dimadi, Konstantinos Tzathas, Vaso Vasilatou
Head of Production: Vasilis Panagiotakopoulos
Project Manager & Producer: Christina Pitouli
Exhibition Adaptation Design: Antonis Kokkoris
Production: Marianota Giannaki, Danae Giannakopoulou
Lighting Design: Vangelis Moundrichas, Pavlos Pappas
Film Screening Program Curator: Elizampetta Ilia Georgiadou
Technical Director: Antonis Kokkoris
Deputy Technical Director: Giannis Ntovas
Technical Office Coordinator: Rebecca Stamou
A co-production of Eye Filmmuseum and Onassis Stegi, in close collaboration with Tilda Swinton
Performance | A Biographical Wardrobe | Tilda Swinton & Olivier Saillard
In six unique encounters with the audience, Tilda Swinton, together with renowned fashion curator Olivier Saillard, brings her own eclectic clothing collection to life. She generously takes us on an autobiographical journey, unpacking family heirlooms, red carpet dresses, film costumes, and personal items.
Tilda Swinton meets the Athenian audience in an intimate, deeply personal performance, inspired by a remarkable collection of personal outfits, clothes, costumes, and objects. She unravels her life and, along with it, fragments of her family’s history, her Scottish heritage, and the broader history of the 20th century: from “imposed femininity” to queer identity and from World War I to pop culture. Through A Biographical Wardrobe, presented as part of her exhibition at Onassis Ready, Swinton and Saillard bring her collection to life as a tender gesture of memory and presence, as a tribute to the families and friendships she cherishes, as well as the personal and professional moments that have shaped her.
Revered fashion historian and curator Olivier Saillard is known for his forward-thinking fashion presentations. Rather than soulless mannequins, his exhibitions feature minimalist installations that evoke the living body. His performances breathe life into historical garments. Saillard and Swinton have collaborated on several such presentations, with Swinton in the role of living ‘socle’ or foundation.
Her timeless, gender-fluid appearance offers an effortless capacity to incarnate an array of historical eras and embodies a gamut of people and characters, such as The Impossible Wardrobe, featuring unwearable objects from the collection of the Galliera Fashion Museum in Paris, and Embodying Pasolini, in which, by reanimating costumes known for their brief lives captured on film, Swinton creates an unspoken dialogue with these ongoing traces from Pasolini’s iconic work. The latter was presented at Onassis Stegi in December 2023.
In the performance A Biographical Wardrobe, Saillard and Swinton together tell the story of Swinton’s personal wardrobe, comprising garments worn by her forebears and countless costumes and outfits she has worn in films, in the public arena, and continues to wear in her private life.
16-19/5/2026 — Performance by Tilda Swinton and Olivier Saillard
The performance “A Biographical Wardrobe” is held by Tilda Swinton and renowned fashion curator Olivier Saillard from May 16 to 19, as part of the exhibition.
22/05 – 26/06/2026 — Film Screenings
Every Friday, throughout the duration of the exhibition, a curated film program unfolds on the rooftop of Onassis Ready, presenting six feature-length films, each introduced by a short film selected by Tilda Swinton herself.
19/05/2026 — Masterclass with Tilda Swinton
In the frame of her exhibition, Tilda Swinton invites audiences into an intimate, open‑ended exploration of creative life in a masterclass titled “Fellowship, Art, & Nature.”
Film Screenings | Tilda Swinton – Ongoing
Open-air cinema on Onassis Ready’s rooftop
May 22—June 26, 2026 | Every Friday, 9 pm
An open-air cinema is set on the rooftop of Onassis Ready, featuring screenings of short and feature-length films every Friday, alongside the exhibition, highlighting the breadth of Tilda Swinton’s multifaceted work.
During the exhibition, the rooftop of Onassis Ready hosts a program comprising six feature-length films, each introduced by a short film selected by Swinton herself. The focus is on the groundbreaking actress and the film roles that shaped her, as well as the directors participating in the exhibition alongside her: Pedro Almodóvar, Luca Guadagnino, Joanna Hogg, Derek Jarman, Jim Jarmusch, and Apichatpong Weerasethakul. From her cinematic debut, Caravaggio, to the cult vampire film Only Lovers Left Alive, from the existential journey of Memoria to the sexual liberation of Io sono l’amore [I Am Love], and from the emotional journey of loss in The Room Next Door to the subversive gothic narrative of The Eternal Daughter, the screenings trace the arc of this iconic actress through her collaborations with the leading directors of our time.
Screenings Program
May 22, 2026
Depuis le Jour (fragment from Aria) (1987), Derek Jarman, Duration: 6 min
Caravaggio (1986), Derek Jarman, Duration: 93 min
May 29, 2026
Bloeiende bloemen en plantenbewegingen (1932), J.C. Mol, Duration: 4:17 min
Io sono l’amore [I Am Love] (2009), Luca Guadagnino, Duration: 120 min
June 5, 2026
January Stories (version Harinezumi) (2024), Apichatpong Weerasethakul, Duration: 4 min
Memoria (2021), Apichatpong Weerasethakul, Duration: 136 min
June 12, 2026
Springer Spaniels (2018), Tilda Swinton & Sandro Kopp, Duration: 6 min
The Room Next Door (2024), Pedro Almodóvar, Duration: 110 min
June 19, 2026
A Portrait of Ga (1952), Margaret Tait, Duration: 5 min
The Eternal Daughter (2022), Joanna Hogg, Duration: 96 min
June 26, 2026
Interlude (2005), Joost van Veen, Duration: 2 min
Only Lovers Left Alive (2013), Jim Jarmusch, Duration: 123 min
