The name Costantino Nivola deserves to be better known — especially in New York, where the mid-20th-century artist contributed sculptural murals to numerous public spaces. A friend and collaborator of Le Corbusier and Eero Saarinen, Sardinian-born Nivola is best known for his sand-casting technique, which he used to craft a 23-metre-long relief for the (now-defunct) Olivetti showroom on Fifth Ave before moving on to bigger civic and institutional commissions, like The Family at Beach Channel High School in Queens. As art historian Michelle Bogart described it, “Nivola was in many ways the municipal civic public sculptor for New York City in the 1960s.”

This exhibition at the Triennale Milano (running from November 11 to February 14, 2027) features over 200 works that trace the main stages of Nivola’s life and artistic research. His architectural commissions, which included the 43 sculptures, reliefs and fountains he designed at Saarinen’s request for the Morse and Ezra Stiles Colleges at Yale University, represent just one focus of his multi-disciplinary studio. Nivola was also a prolific graphic designer and art director for numerous magazines, and envisioned entire urban schemes. In 1953, Nivola dreamt up the idea for “Pergola Village,” which would connect all of the houses in Orani, his native hometown, with umbrellas. That idea never came to fruition but, with frequent collaborator Richard Stein, he did execute the design of many public squares in Italy and the U.S., including Piazza Satta in Nuoro, dedicated to the early-20th-century poet Sebastiano Satta.