Opening: Thursday, 19 February 2026, 19:30
The exhibition “Three Paths: Constantine Manos, Nikos Economopoulos, Enri Canaj” presented in MOMUS-Thessaloniki Museum of Photography and coorganised with Benaki Museum, from 19 February until 24 May 2026, is an original proposal as well as a tribute. With street photography as its backbone, a dominant artistic trend of the photographic medium in the second half of the 20th century, it bridges three generations of artists with common point of reference their relationship with Greece and their membership in the famous Magnum Photos agency, which has written since its foundation in 1947 and until today, to a large degree, modern world’s history in images.
Greek-American Constantine Manos walks around the country in the sixties as a contemporary Ulysses, looking to heal the latent wound of migration. Nikos Economopoulos crosses Greece and the Balkans in the last two decades of the 20th century focusing mainly in fragile minorities and turbulent communities. Greek-Albanian Enri Canaj, respectively, visits in the second decade of the 21st century a homeland he never got to know properly, imprinted though deeply in the memories of his childhood and dwelling still in the everyday family stories.
The expressiveness of the snapshot, the dedication on the everyday, underprivileged man, the Balkan place as a womb of common experiences and wounds, the occasionally melancholic austereness of the black and white tones in a contemporary world dressed now with vivid, saturated colors, act as common elements of the three artistic generations, that maintained among them a relationship of support and/or apprenticeship. Walking through the exhibition one may also spontaneously trace the historical, aesthetic and social relevance in the work of the three photographers, as they distill from the world the substance of life and photography.
The works of Constantine Manos and Nikos Economopoulos belong to the collection of the Benaki Museum Photographic Archives, Athens.
Curated by: Hercules Papaioannou, Curator of MOMUS-Thessaloniki Museum of Photography
Artists’ Talks
MOMUS-Thessaloniki Museum of Photography (Warehouse Α’, Pier Α’, Port of Thessaloniki)
Friday, 20 February 2026, 19:00-21:00
The photographers Nikos Economopoulos and Enri Canaj talk with the exhibition’s curator, Hercules Papaioannou, and the audience about their work and the dimensions of street photography nowadays.
The discussion will be held in Greek. No translation provided.
Participation with the exhibition’s ticket.
CV’s
Constantine Manos (1934-2025) was born in Columbia, South Carolina, U.S.A., of Greek immigrant parents. At the age of nineteen he was hired as the official photographer of the Boston Symphony Orchestra. He studied English Literature at the University of South Carolina. Moving to New York, he worked for Esquire, Life, and Look magazines. From 1961 through 1963 Manos lived in Greece, where he made the photographs for his book A Greek Portfolio - first published in 1972. The book won awards at Arles and at the Leipzig Book Fair and opened the door for Manos in becoming in 1963 a member of Magnum Photos. His photographs are in the permanent collections of the Museum of Modern Art in New York, the Museum of Fine Arts in Boston, the Art Institute of Chicago, the Museum of Fine Arts in Houston, the George Eastman House in Rochester and the Benaki Museum in Athens. In 1982 Manos switched his personal work from black and white to color. Work from Manos' ongoing color project first appeared in his book American Color, published in 1995. In 2000 his book American Color 2 followed. In 2003 Manos was awarded the Leica Medal of Excellence.
Nikos Economopoulos was born in the Peloponnese, Greece, in 1953. He studied law and worked as a journalist in Parma, Italy, before dedicating himself to photography. He joined Magnum Photos in 1990 after a proposal by Constantine Manos, and his photographs began appearing in newspapers and magazines around the world. In the same period, he started traveling and photographing extensively around the Balkans. This work won him the Mother Jones Award for work in progress. Upon completion of his Balkans project in 1994, Economopoulos became a full member of Magnum Photos. His book, In the Balkans, was published in 1995 in New York and Athens. In the 1990s, Economopoulos started working on borders and crossings, photographing the inhabitants of the “Green Line” in Cyprus, the irregular migrants on the Greek-Albanian borderline, and the mass migration of ethnic Albanians fleeing Kosovo. In the mid-1990s, he started photographing the Roma and other minorities. A retrospective of his work, titled Economopoulos, Photographer, was published in 2002 and later exhibited at the Benaki Museum in Athens in 2005. Economopoulos has turned to the use of color and is currently spending most of his time away from Greece, travelling, teaching, and photographing around the world.
Enri Canaj was born in Tirana, Albania, in 1980. He moved with his family to Greece in 1991. He studied photography in Athens and in 2007 he took part in a British Council project on migration, attending a year-long workshop with photographer Nikos Economopoulos. Since 2008, he has been a freelance photographer for major national and international publications and is now is a member of Magnum Photos. Based in Athens, he has exhibited his work widely in Greece as well as Belgium, Luxembourg, France, Switzerland, Germany, Italy, while he presented a personal show at the Rencontres d’ Arles photography festival. His work has been honored with grants and awards, and has been published in media such as Times Magazine, CNN, The Guardian, New York Times, Financial Times, Newsweek, National Geographic, Le Monde, Wall Street Journal, Arte TV. He has collaborated with institutions such as Princeton University, UNICEF, Melissa - Network of Migrant Women in Greece, MSF, Solidarity Now, European Parliament, Thessaloniki Documentary Festival.
Coorganisation
