The Nivola Museum is an institution dedicated to the figure of Costantino Nivola, contemporary art, landscape and living traditions.
The museum was established in 1995, a few years after the death of Costantino Nivola (Orani, 1911 – East Hampton, 1988).
The permanent collection consists of more than two hundred sculptures, paintings and drawings by Nivola.
The museum also hosts temporary exhibitions focusing on the relationship between art, architecture, and landscape, with a special focus on artists and movements close to Nivola, such as Le Corbusier, Jackson Pollock, Saul Steinberg, Willem de Kooning, and Alexander Calder.
The museum grew out of the renovation, designed by Peter Chermayeff and Umberto Floris, of Orani’s old washhouse, a symbolic place of the village’s ancient community life.
Located in a panoramic position on a hill, it includes within its enclosure the “Su Càntaru” spring.
In 2004 it was expanded with the construction of a pavilion designed by Chermayeff and initially intended to contain sandcasts.
In 2012, following an international competition won by Gianfranco Crisci, the complex was supplemented by the addition of a third structure.
The spaces of the new wing, redesigned internally in 2015 by the layout designed by Alessandro Floris, house the permanent collection in a path designed to allow non-discriminatory enjoyment for visitors with mobility problems and at the same time to offer a more complete and effective presentation of Nivola’s work.
The square at the center of the complex, crossed by a line of water coming from the ancient spring and overlooking the striking panorama of the valley, is together with the park a key element of the museum settlement.