What We Carry is the new exhibition at the Museion in Bolzano, intertwining contemporary art and the Olympic spirit, transforming a universal symbol — the torch — into an object of cultural reflection. Curated by Bart van der Heide and part of the Cultural Olympiad of Milano Cortina 2026, the exhibition brings together the work of Sonia Leimer and Christian Kosmas Mayer, alongside a unique collection of 43 Olympic torches (from 1936 to 2024).
At the heart of the exhibition lies Leimer’s installation: a fifty-meter-long sculpture shaped like the infinity symbol, reminiscent of a running track, hosting the torches as if they were witnesses of a living legacy. It’s a work that turns the act of carrying the flame into a reflection on continuity, memory, and change. Leimer, long interested in how spaces and objects narrate social transformations, invites the viewer to question what we “carry with us” — symbolically and physically — in our relationship with time.
Mayer, on the other hand, constructs a dialogue with history, bringing to the fore the first Olympic torch from 1936. Within his installation, the torch enters into conversation with the story of African American athlete Cornelius Cooper Johnson, who won gold in Berlin but was ignored both by Nazi Germany and his own country. The Olympic oak that Johnson planted in Los Angeles now becomes part of Mayer’s work, which displays its saplings as living witnesses of a resilient memory: a contrast between the fleeting fire of propaganda and the enduring rootedness of lived history.
Alongside the physical installations, Leimer’s new video Solar (2025) reinterprets the ceremonial origins of the Olympic flame through light, landscape, and gesture, evoking the sun’s primordial energy as a symbol of continuity and rebirth.
What We Carry is therefore an encounter between art, sport, and universal values, a reflection on the collective legacy passed on like a burning torch. In the words of director Bart van der Heide, «cultural heritage is not something immutable, but a living force that continues to shape our shared present and future». On view at the Museion in Bolzano from November 13, 2025, to March 29, 2026, What We Carry invites visitors to rediscover the meaning of what we hold — within objects, stories, and memory.
in cover, ph. ©Luca Guadagnini
