Banca Ifis’s Villa Fürstenberg International Sculpture Park in Mestre (Venice) will reopen to the public on Sunday, April 19, 2026, with free admission by reservation through the Ifis art app. The site, which opened in 2023 and has become over the years one of the spaces dedicated to contemporary sculpture, recorded more than 6,000 visitors in 2025 and is preparing for a new exhibition season accompanied by an expansion of public activities and works in the collection.
The main novelty in 2026 concerns the entry into the park of a new work by Anselm Kiefer, one of the best-known German artists on the international scene, who is also currently present with an exhibition at the Palazzo Reale in Milan (our review here). Margarete v Antioch (2019), a 160 x 130 x 175 cm bronze sculpture belonging to the Women of Antiquity series, will be placed in the garden of Villa Fürstenberg. The work refers to the figure of Margaret of Antioch, a young Christian martyr revered as a protector of women in childbirth and a symbol of resilience and spirituality.
With this acquisition, the park reaches 26 total sculptures, distributed among the works of 16 Italian and international artists. The collection includes works by Tony Cragg, Giuseppe Penone, Fernando Botero, Annie Morris, Park Eun Sun, Igor Mitoraj, Manolo Valdés, Pablo Atchugarry, Pietro Consagra, Roberto Barni, Julio Larraz, Philip Colbert, Jaume Plensa, Nico Vascellari, Davide Rivalta, and now Anselm Kiefer.
Along with the expansion of the exhibition itinerary, Banca Ifis has planned for 2026 an extension of the park’s access modes. Sunday openings will remain confirmed with continuous hours from 10 a.m. to 7 p.m., but will be joined by eight special openings on Saturdays throughout the year. The full schedule of visits will be available on the free Ifis art app and the bank’s website.
An additional intervention concerns the enhancement of accessibility and inclusion measures. All the works in the park have been equipped with braille captions to allow people with visual impairments to enjoy them. Tactile guided tours dedicated to the visually impaired are also planned. On the hearing disability front, the Ifis art app integrates video guides in Italian sign language (LIS), allowing an autonomous visit of the exhibition route even for deaf people.
The 2026 program of activities confirms the park’s role as a place for discussion of contemporary cultural issues. The calendar includes events, workshops, study days and initiatives included in the Public Program of the Italian Pavilion of the Venice Biennale 2026, of which Banca Ifis has been a partner since 2022. The general approach includes a dialogue between art, business and cultural research.
The first event is scheduled for April 28 at 4:30 p.m. with the conferenceGovernare l’eccellenza: un modello per l’alto artigianato, sponsored by the Ministry of Business and Made in Italy. On that occasion, the seventh edition of Economy of Beauty, an observatory of Banca Ifis’ Social Impact Lab Kaleidos, will be presented. The survey, dedicated to the value of Italian know-how, analyzes 12 business realities and a sample of 400 companies, identifying a model based on brand identity, international distribution, corporate culture, territory and technology. According to the data presented, such an approach would have a potential impact of 46 billion euros on the international positioning of companies, with reflections on gross domestic product.
Starting in May, the park will also host the Public Program initiatives of the Italian Pavilion of the Venice Biennale, curated by Lungomare. Activities will kick off in late June with a study day dedicated to the relationship between the garden and the analysis of the living through art, curated by artist Chiara Camoni. The program will continue with a meeting on forms of intelligence scheduled for September and an additional event dedicated to multilingualism scheduled for October. The site will also be involved in the Art Night Venezia event, scheduled for June 20, organized by Ca’ Foscari University, which will include extraordinary evening openings and a program spread among the city’s museums, foundations and cultural institutions.
A section of the 2026 program is dedicated to activities for children and young people. Between June and September there are three workshops held in collaboration with the Štěpán Zavřel International Exhibition of Illustration for Children Foundation in Sarmede. On June 7 there will be Piccole houses, a workshop curated by illustrator Martina Tonello, dedicated to building an insect village through materials such as wood, paper, tempera and adhesives. On Sept. 20, it will be the turn of A Shape of Nature, curated by Anna Benotto, inspired by the book Karl and the Forms of Nature and the photographic work of Karl Blossfeldt, with activities dedicated to transforming natural details into creative projects related to architecture, clothing and design. An additional workshop, entrusted to artist Charlotte Colbert, will be organized in conjunction with the installation of an interactive work aimed at younger audiences.
Placed among the foliage, in a small ravine in the garden of the Villa Fürstenberg International Park, Anselm Kiefer’s Margarete v Antioch emerges in a condition of candid purity. The figure hints at Margaret of Antioch, revered by both Catholic and Orthodox traditions, which recognize her as the patroness of women in childbirth. According to tradition, the young saint remained faithful to her faith, refusing all compromise and suffering, in the course of her short existence, various forms of persecution until her death by beheading when she was only 15 years old.
The work is part of the cycle of sculptures that Kiefer, beginning in the late 1990s, has dedicated to female figures from history and myth, often associated with narratives of martyrdom and violence suffered. In these works, the protagonists are represented as presences protected by a kind of armor, often identified in a white dress, an element that alludes to purity and inner strength. The sculpture testifies to the artist’s attention to the female world and to biographies marked by forms of overpowering and erasure. This thematic line has accompanied Kiefer’s production since the 1990s and has developed in parallel with his painting, building a constellation of references to historical, mythological and religious figures traceable to the same narrative core.
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| Banca Ifis reopens Villa Fürstenberg Park (Mestre) with a new work by Anselm Kiefer |
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