Chihuly Returns to Venice with a Dazzling Glass Revival

There are few cities capable of transforming light into mythology quite like Venice. Water fractures reflections into moving paintings. Gold mosaics dissolve into mist. Marble facades shimmer as though suspended between matter and dream. It is fitting, then, that Dale Chihuly has chosen Venice once again as the stage for his most ambitious public return in decades.

Thirty years after the groundbreaking Chihuly Over Venice project altered perceptions of contemporary glass forever, the American artist returns with CHIHULY: Venice 2026, a large-scale exhibition unfolding across the Grand Canal during the Venice Biennale. Presented by Pilchuck Glass School and Frederik Meijer Gardens & Sculpture Park, the exhibition marks both a celebration and a reckoning: a return to the city that fundamentally shaped Chihuly’s understanding of scale, spectacle, and artistic collaboration.