George Koutsouflakis, Director, Department of Archaeological Sites, Monuments and Research, Hellenic Ephorate of Underwater Antiquities. The exhibition Power and Pathos: Bronze Sculpture of the Hellenistic World, which was on view from December 13, 2015, through March 20, 2016, at the National Gallery of Art, features 50 works that survey the development of Hellenistic art as it spread from Greece throughout the Mediterranean between the fourth and first centuries BC. On land sites, bronze artworks have seldom survived the vicissitudes of history. The sea remains the richest reservoir of ancient bronzes lost during transit. While the Aegean Sea has yielded some of the most spectacular and well-known masterpieces over the last century, only a handful of them have been retrieved from excavated shipwrecks. These limited discoveries are far outnumbered by isolated, chance finds, raised by fishing nets, which present no direct evidence of their context. No matter how exceptional, isolated bronzes offer little information on the circumstances of their transit. At the same time, wreck sites from where they were detached remain elusive and seem to persistently resist discovery. In this lecture, recorded on January 17, 2016, marine archaeologist George Koutsouflakis presents an overview of bronzes found in the Aegean, highlighting the conditions of their recovery, the elusiveness of the wrecks, and the historical context of their transportation. This program is cosponsored by the Washington, DC Society of the Archaeological Institute of America.