ATHENS, GREECE, October 8, 2026 — On the evening of October 6, Cotsen Hall was full and humming with anticipation as Katherine E. Fleming rose to deliver the final lecture of the 2025/2026 Thalia Potamianos Lecture Series. With Cotsen Hall at capacity, an overflow audience gathered in the Main Reading Room of the Gennadius Library, while more than 2,000 people joined online, extending the evening well beyond the walls of the American School.

Entitled “Supergreeks: Greek Jews in the Mediterranean Cultural Imaginary,” the lecture brought to a close Fleming’s three-part series, “These Two Points of Influence: Judaism, Hellenism, and Modern Greece.” Across the series, Fleming considered the intertwined, sometimes uneasy histories of Greek and Jewish cultures and their enduring influence on the Mediterranean world and modern Greece.

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Katherine E. Fleming, delivers her final lecture of 2025/2026 Thalia Potamianos Lecture Series
 

Bonna D. Wescoat, Director of the American School of Classical Studies at Athens

Bonna D. Wescoat, Director of the American School of Classical Studies at Athens, welcomed the audience. Maria Georgopoulou, Director of the Gennadius Library, offered opening remarks about the series and invited Mareva Grabowski-Mitsotakis to introduce Professor Fleming. In her remarks, Mrs. Grabowski-Mitsotakis spoke warmly of Fleming’s “drive, determination, and professional will,” qualities that have shaped a career of exceptional scholarship and leadership.

Fleming’s final lecture explored the place of Greek Jews in the Mediterranean cultural imagination, recovering histories that have too often receded from view. Combining historical inquiry with music and archival voices, she gave her audience not merely an account of the past but a vivid encounter with it.


Maria Georgopoulou, Director of the Gennadius Library

“Throughout this remarkable series, Katherine Fleming has brought the full force of her scholarship to bear on the entwined histories of Judaism, Hellenism, and modern Greece, while making that scholarship feel vividly alive,” said Maria Georgopoulou, Director of the Gennadius Library. “With extraordinary range, sensitivity, and imagination, she has illuminated voices and histories too often left at the margins, drawing audiences into a richer understanding of the Mediterranean world. Her distinctive presentation style gave the lectures an exceptional texture and emotional immediacy. It has been a profound privilege for the Gennadius Library to welcome her for the Thalia Potamianos Lecture Series.”

Fleming is President and CEO of the J. Paul Getty Trust and the Alexander S. Onassis Professor of Hellenic Culture and Civilization in the Department of History at New York University. She is the author of Greece, a Jewish History, winner of the National Jewish Book Award and the Runciman Prize. Her work has illuminated the complexity and continuing relevance of the shared histories of Greeks and Jews.

 

Mareva Grabowski-Mitsotakis introduces Katherine Fleming

The series began in Los Angeles on January 12 and continued in New York City on May 6 before its final gathering in Athens. Each lecture was offered free to the public, in person and online, extending the work of the Gennadius Library far beyond its walls.

Inaugurated in 2020, the Thalia Potamianos Lecture Series is made possible through the generosity of Gennadius Library Overseer Phokion Potamianos, who established it in memory of his grandmother, Thalia Potamianos, a distinguished Greek biochemist, scientist, and philanthropist. The series brings internationally renowned scholars to the Gennadius Library for research and public lectures that engage audiences in Athens and the United States.

Past presenters have included Peter Frankopan, Professor of Global History at the University of Oxford and Stavros Niarchos Foundation Director of the Oxford Centre for Byzantine Research, whose lectures considered Greece’s enduring cultural influence across more than two and a half millennia. The series has also featured Emily Wilson, Professor of Classical Studies at the University of Pennsylvania and acclaimed translator of Homer’s Odyssey and Iliad, whose lectures explored the challenges and possibilities of translating the ancient Greek world for modern readers.

Looking ahead, the Gennadius Library will welcome Andrea Myers Achi for the 2028 Thalia Potamianos Lecture Series. Achi is the Mary and Michael Jaharis Curator of Byzantine Art at The Metropolitan Museum of Art. Her forthcoming exhibition, Legacy of an Empire: Byzantium after Byzantium, will be on view at The Metropolitan Museum of Art from April 3 through September 4, 2028, and will include loans from the Gennadius Library. An art historian and archaeologist specializing in Late Antique, Byzantine, and Eastern Christian art, Achi oversees the care, study, and interpretation of The Met’s collections in these fields. Her exhibitions include the acclaimed Africa and Byzantium, which expanded understanding of Byzantium’s cultural connections across Africa and the Mediterranean. She holds a Ph.D. in Byzantine Art History and Archaeology from New York University’s Institute of Fine Arts.

A photo gallery from the October 6 lecture, along with recordings of the presentation in English and with Greek interpretation, is available below.