An exhibition on Maria Callas in Beaulieu-sur-Mer, with the diva’s personal items

The exhibition called Maria Callas, a modern icon comes, in part, from an important private collection. It brings together many pieces that trace the incredible destiny of the diva.

>> Maria Callas: her glory years at La Scala

The gloves of Maria Callas in La Traviata of Verdi, his glasses, his scores or letters from relatives. Here are some of the treasures that visitors can discover in the magnificent villa Kérylos overlooking the Mediterranean, between Nice and Monaco. A building built on the model of the sumptuous residences of ancient Greece where the objects of the great artist have their place. Born in New York in 1923, Maria Callas returned to live in Greece with her mother in 1937 where, two years later, she began to sing. It was in Italy, in the early 1950s, that his career exploded. “She was born with a voice that was big but not beautiful by the rules of the time. She transformed it. For me, that’s the La Callas miracle,” says Nikos Haralambopoulos, the Greek private collector who loaned the exhibits. “She was a perfectionist artist who always looked for the best in her art”, adds Christophe Corbier, curator of the exhibition.

A star who arouses passions

On the walls of the Villa Kérylos, photographs by Maria Callas on the greatest international stages, from La Scala in Milan to the Metropolitan Opera in New York, immerse the visitor in the atmosphere of that time. These shots come from the Parisian photographic agency Roger-Viollet. Her exceptional voice, her talents as a playwright propelled the diva to the top of the bill, to the rank of star, well beyond the circle of opera lovers. “She aroused delirious passions and also very violent criticism. She was a diva in every sense of the word” reports Christophe Corbier, curator of the exhibition. Considered one of the greatest dramatic sopranos of all time, she was also a passionate woman who made the cover of magazines of the time, notably with her great love, the other most famous Greek of her time, the billionaire Aristotle Onassis, their two names still remaining inseparable today.

Exposure Maria Callas, a modern icon – Villa Kérylos, impasse Gustave Eiffel in Beaulieu-sur-Mer (Alpes-Maritimes) – Until September 3, 2023.