Mr. Nektarios S. Antoniou holds a post-graduate degree at the Institute of Sacred Music, Yale University. He is a Curator of the Mount Athos Center in Thessaloniki, Greece and is completing his Ph.D. in Byzantine music at the Aristotle University of Thessaloniki. He is the Founding & Artistic Director of the Schola Cantorum Choir.

A specialist in early Christian and Byzantine art, Dr. Helen C. Evans is the Mary and Michael Jaharis Curator for Byzantine Art at The Metropolitan Museum of Art in New York. She is best known as the curator of The Metropolitan Museum’s two major Byzantine exhibitions: The Glory of Byzantium: Art and Culture of the Middle Byzantine Era (843-1261) in 1997 and Byzantium: Faith and Power (1261-1557) in 2004. Both were named major cultural events of their years by the New York Times and one of the top five shows of their years by Apollo Magazine. In 2000 she installed the Mary and Michael Jaharis Galleries of Byzantine Art at the Metropolitan Museum, the first galleries dedicated to Byzantine art in a major museum, and expanded the galleries in 2008. She has written numerous scholarly articles and co-authored catalogues for exhibitions she organized at the Met as well as the Morgan Library, the Walters Art Museum in Baltimore, the Benaki Museum in Athens, and the Foundation Pierre Gianadda in Switzerland. Dr. Evans has taught at the Institute of Fine Arts of New York University, Columbia University, the University of Chicago, and Oberlin College and has lectured extensively in Europe and America. Dr. Helen Evans also serves as a member of the Mary Jaharis Center for Byzantine Art and Culture Administrative Board.

Dr. Ryan Preston holds a Ph.D. in the Study of Religion from Harvard University, where he wrote a dissertation focusing on the intersection of art, religion, and national identity in the work of the modern Greek icon painter Photis Kontoglou. For five years, he taught at Arcadia University in Athens, Greece. Currently he is Adjunct Professor in Religion and Art at The Newberry Library in Chicago. He is also engaged in research on the revival of Byzantine art in modern Greece and developing multiple courses in comparative sacred art among the world’s religions.