The exhibitions not to miss during Milano Cortina 2026: sport becomes art, design, and storytelling

What role does design play in extreme sports? This question is the starting point for White Out. The Future of Winter Sports, an exhibition running until March 15 at the Triennale Milano, curated by Konstantin Grcic and Marco Sammicheli, as part of the Milan-Cortina 2026 cultural program. The exhibition explores the relationship between design and winter sports, showing how these two disciplines complement each other. Design has helped make these sports technically possible, safe, and high-performing, while technical demands have contributed to the development and research of new materials, shapes, and technologies. The exhibition, divided into thematic sections, presents around two hundred objects, including sports equipment, safety devices, gear, and architectural projects from 1938 to the present day. On display are racing suits, Olympic and Paralympic skis, a German national team bobsled, and a carbon fiber sit-ski, highlighting the centrality of design for both able-bodied and disabled athletes.

From ancient Greece to contemporary icons, Sport. The Challenging the Body explores the body as a performative tool in sports. The major exhibition at Mart in Rovereto, running until March 22, 2026, for the Milan Cortina 2026 Cultural Olympics, is curated by Antonio Calbi and Daniela Ferrari and presents 350 works including art, objects, documents, and memorabilia. Divided into eight thematic sections, the exhibition spans over two thousand years of the history of movement: sculptures and vases from antiquity, photographs by Eadweard Muybridge, and works by Umberto Boccioni, Robert Mapplethorpe, Renato Guttuso, Massimo Campigli, and many other contemporary and non-contemporary artists. In this exhibition, the masterpieces in the Mart's collection are presented alongside loans from Italian museums, together with historical photographs, trophies, and archival materials, in a reflection on sport as a mass phenomenon and on art as a constructor of mythical iconography.

From ancient Greece to the Olympics of the future, The Olympic Games™. A 3000-Year History recounts the epic story of sport as ritual, myth, and universal language. On the occasion of the Milan Cortina 2026 Winter Olympic and Paralympic Games, the Luigi Rovati Foundation presents a major exhibition that traces the protagonists and values of competitive sport from antiquity to the present day. Produced in collaboration with the Olympic Museum and the Musée cantonal d'archéologie et d'histoire in Lausanne, and curated by Anne-Cécile Jaccard, Patricia Reymond, Giulio Paolucci, and Lionel Pernet, the exhibition overlaps the ancient and contemporary worlds to recount the continuity of the Olympic ideal. Divided into five sections, the exhibition brings together archaeological finds and modern objects, revealing the links between sport, art, and spirituality. Among the loans are the Tomb of the Olympics in Tarquinia and memorabilia such as Usain Bolt's jersey and Pierre de Coubertin's gloves.

Competition is the third and final act of the long-term project Anelli di congiunzione (Connecting Links) and explores the role of emotions in Olympic and Paralympic sports, accompanying visitors into the minds of athletes before, during, and after competition. At the heart of the project are the six basic emotions—happiness, sadness, anger, fear, surprise, and disgust—as forces that unite athletes and audiences and which, at the highest levels, become as decisive as physical preparation. The exhibition opens with a reference to the studies of Charles Darwin and Paul Ekman and is divided into four large immersive areas: Speed and Emotion, Before, During, and After the competition, with images from the archives of the Olympic Museum in Lausanne. Two interactive installations, Face Recognition and Words of Olympians, create a direct link with the athletes. The finale is dedicated to the “Competition Venues” in Trentino for Milan Cortina 2026, with VR spaces and a digital gym for younger visitors.

From the snow-covered slopes of the 1930s to the Olympic dreams of the post-war period, Winter games! Winter sports is a journey through images in the history of the 20th century, through the lens of LIFE magazine. From February 20 to June 2, 2026, the International Center of Photography - Scavi Scaligeri in Verona reopens to the public with an exhibition focusing on the relationship between sport, photography, and the collective imagination. Curated by Simone Azzoni based on an idea by Giuseppe Ceroni, the exhibition features around one hundred images, many of which have never been seen before, by masters such as Alfred Eisenstaedt, George Silk, Ralph Crane, and John Dominis. From the 1936 Olympics in Garmisch-Partenkirchen to Sapporo in 1972, via Cortina in 1956, the photographs recount almost forty years of history marked by wars, reconstruction, and economic growth. The athletes become bodies in motion and icons of an era, while holidays, fashions, and resorts reveal sport as a collective ritual and symbol of progress. The exhibition, divided into six thematic sections, unfolds in the restored rooms of the Scaligeri Excavations, in an evocative dialogue between images and archaeology.

Snow as a natural phenomenon, but also as an element that crosses cultures, sciences, and arts. The Sense of Snow, an exhibition curated by Sara Rizzo and Alessandro Oldani in collaboration with the MIPAM network, offers a multidisciplinary journey through science, art, and anthropology, bringing together over 150 works, including paintings, installations, and ethnographic objects. The exhibition opens with boules à neige and Bentley and Nakaya's studies on crystals, alongside computer-generated snowflakes by Barbara T. Smith. From Arctic, Antarctic, and Tibetan cultures to ritual traditions linked to shamanism, snow emerges as a symbol and a matter of identity. In European art, from Brueghel to Longoni and Ligabue, it takes on the role of a visual metaphor, while in the Japanese prints of Hiroshige and Kunisada it evokes purity and transience, right up to the ‘suspended snowfall’ of Chiharu Shiota's installation in the Mudec agora. The exhibition journey reaches the contemporary era with works by Judy Chicago, Pia Arke, Irene Kopelman, and Walter Niedermayr, in which snow and ice become tools for reflection on the relationship between humans and the environment, offering a critical view of the present and its increasingly unstable balance.

The passing of the Olympic flame can be understood as a metaphor for the values that society chooses to convey. What We Carry, an exhibition by Sonia Leimer and Christian Kosmas Mayer at the Museion in Bolzano until March 29, 2026, explores the link between contemporary art and the values of the Milan Cortina 2026 Cultural Olympics: inclusion, sustainability, and legacy. With curatorial support from Bart van der Heide, the project combines new works by the two artists with an extraordinary collection of forty-three Olympic torches (1936–2024), reflecting on the themes of power, visibility, and memory. At the center of the exhibition, a fifty-meter-long sculpture in the shape of an infinity sign, designed by Sonia Leimer, welcomes the torches as if on a symbolic track, transforming them into signs of continuity and transformation. Christian Kosmas Mayer creates a dialogue between the first torch from 1936 and the story of African-American athlete Cornelius Johnson and his ‘Olympic oak tree’, evoking the contrast between propaganda and lived memory. The exhibition is completed by Leimer's video Solar, which reinterprets the ritual birth of the flame through light, landscape, and personal narrative.

IN-PLAY. Design for Sport, an exhibition at the ADI Design Museum on the occasion of Milano Cortina 2026, explores the transformations of sport as a global platform for comparison and a laboratory for design experimentation. Curated by Davide Fabio Colaci with Giulia Novati, the exhibition investigates the relationship between sport, human rights, and design culture, starting from the principle that recognizes sport as a fundamental right. Iconic objects and recent innovations illustrate an ecosystem in which the body, technology, and the environment influence each other: advanced materials, smart devices, prosthetics, and service systems redefine performance and the sporting experience. The exhibition also opens up to emerging disciplines and scenarios in which data, artificial intelligence, and biomedical research transform the very meaning of competition. The installation, consisting of modular aluminum stands and surfaces made from disused athletics tracks, is reversible and sustainable.

When sport meets art, a story is born that represents an entire country. On the occasion of the Milan Cortina 2026 Winter Olympic and Paralympic Games, CONI presents Casa Italia, which opens to the public for the first time as a cultural space spread across Milan, Livigno, and Cortina d'Ampezzo. A platform for welcoming visitors and telling the story of Italy through culture, innovation, sustainability, and tradition, Casa Italia is transformed into an immersive journey that highlights the country's human and creative heritage. The chosen theme is Musa, a tribute to Italy's inspirational power, understood as a source of beauty, memory, and vision. The synthesis of a project launched in 2016, Musa builds on the legacy of previous editions and consolidates Casa Italia as an international cultural meeting point. The concept takes shape in three exceptional venues—Triennale Milano, Aquagranda Livigno, and Galleria Farsetti in Cortina—transformed into emotional settings where sport, art, architecture, and design interact. A major exhibition project, featuring works by historical masters and contemporary artists, tells the story of a pluralistic, open, and constantly changing Italy.

Before the Olympics became the global media event we know today, it was the images that built its myth. The Road to Cortina. VII Winter Olympic Games 1956 is the exhibition that Gallerie d'Italia is presenting at the Milan venue from February 6 to May 3, 2026, curated by Aldo Grasso, on the occasion of Milano Cortina 2026. The exhibition showcases the photographic services of the Publifoto Agency, which documented the first Winter Olympics hosted in Italy. Through black-and-white shots and rare color images, the exhibition traces the event from its beginnings: the construction of the infrastructure, the arrival of the torch, the opening ceremony, behind-the-scenes footage of the competitions, and the closing ceremony. Athletes in training, moments of leisure, the public, reporters, and images commissioned by companies convey an image that tells not only the story of sport, but also of Italy in 1956, at the height of the economic boom.

The Winter Olympics reach Venice through art: Berggruen Arts & Culture presents Eisfeld II, an artificial ice installation by Olaf Nicolai, on display at Palazzo Diedo until February 22, 2026. The work consists of a 100-square-meter skating rink located in the frescoed ballroom of the 18th-century palace, creating a dialogue between sporting gesture, historical space, and artificial landscape. Six loudspeakers broadcast a sound composition that amplifies the movements of visitors, transforming skating into a sensory and collective experience. Originally conceived over twenty years ago, Eisfeld II has been reinterpreted specifically for Palazzo Diedo. At the sides of the rink, the light boxes ENJOY/SURVIVE I & II invite reflection on the delicate balance between pleasure and survival. The installation also stimulates reflection on the role of art venues, understood as spaces open to the public that invite participation.

With the opening of its new headquarters at Via Saffi 27, the Franco Albini Foundation celebrates this year's Winter Olympics with one of the perhaps lesser-known but very ambitious chapters in the history of Italian design: the project for the 1956 Winter Olympics in Cortina entrusted to Franco Albini, Franca Helg, and Albe Steiner. Through photographs, drawings, and archival documents, the exhibition reconstructs the graphic and staging solutions imagined for the event, many of which remained only on paper due to their bold design, allowing visitors to explore the relationship between graphic design, architecture, and large-scale communication. Also on display is a film consisting of three black-and-white reels and two color reels, documenting the staging of the town center, the only case in which Albini decided to film one of his own works. Curated by the Franco Albini Foundation and staged by Studio Albini Associati, the exhibition recounts the full force of a project that anticipated the contemporary way of thinking about major events.

At an altitude of 2,732 meters, the Cortina di Stelle exhibition finds a natural setting of extraordinary beauty in the Lagazuoi Expo Dolomiti exhibition space, suspended between the Dolomites, where light, rock, and altitude amplify the visitor's experience. At the heart of the project are the works of Italian artist Fulvio Morella, who presents three cycles of works in which Braille becomes an artistic language and a tool for inclusion. The project, curated by Sabino Maria Frassà with the patronage of the Italian Paralympic Committee and INJA “Louis Braille,” also stems from discussions with Paralympic athletes in collaboration with FISIP. The works include Blind Wood, tactile paintings-sculptures in wood and metal; Braille Stellato, constellations and encrypted messages; and Braillight, luminous sculptures in steel and amaranth in which light emanates from Braille. At high altitude, the exhibition takes the form of a journey that invites visitors to overcome visual limitations, offering a reflection on perception, accessibility, art, and nature.

Charlotte Perriand: Dalla Montagna La Forza is an exhibition scheduled to run from February 6 to March 10, 2026, presented by Plan C Framework and curated by Enrica Viganò in collaboration with Admira and the Archives Charlotte Perriand. The project explores photography as a tool for thought and design: a “wide-angle” view capable of capturing fragments of reality and transforming them into visions. At the heart of the exhibition is the deep connection between Charlotte Perriand and the mountains, experienced as a vital necessity and a space for physical and moral balance. An expert mountaineer and pioneer in a traditionally male-dominated field, the designer devoted part of her research to high-altitude urban planning and an idea of popular tourism that respects the environment. Alongside mountain landscapes, the series of objets trouvés—stones, bones, and pieces of wood collected and photographed—reveals a gaze capable of recognizing the same harmony in nature and industrial structures.