Basil & Elise Goulandris Foundation

This guide to the Basil & Elise Goulandris Foundation in Athens follows a shipping magnate and his wife who spent nearly fifty years quietly collecting paintings by Cezanne, Van Gogh, Picasso and Pollock, keeping them in their own homes rather than a vault. It traces the bitter family feud, including a rival claim from Basil's niece, that followed his death without a will in 1994, and revisits the day diggers preparing the museum's site struck the ancient Lyceum where Aristotle once taught.