Created in partnership with the New York New Jersey 2026 FIFA World Cup Host Committee, The Art of the Game brings twenty-three internationally acclaimed artists together to reimagine soccer’s most iconic object – the ball – as monumental public sculpture, installed across New York and New Jersey. Museum directors, curators, and cultural leaders helped shape the program and select its artists.

Art and sport share something rare: both cross borders, speak without translation, and pull strangers into the same moment. The Art of the Game puts that connection on full display, placing ambitious contemporary work in parks, plazas, transit hubs, and museums – where millions of people encounter it simply by living their lives.

The program was designed from the beginning to outlast the tournament and become part of the lasting cultural legacy of the 2026 FIFA World Cup™.

Phase Two: The Legacy Program

With the World Cup complete, The Art of the Game enters its second phase: turning a temporary public art experience into a permanent cultural legacy.

Through the Legacy Program, sculptures from the exhibition are being placed via donation with municipalities, parks, museums, universities, cultural institutions, and other public-serving organizations across New York and New Jersey.

Selected partners will become long-term stewards of the works, giving the sculptures permanent homes in publicly accessible spaces where they can continue to be experienced for generations.

Each placement extends the life of the project beyond the tournament itself, creating new civic landmarks and preserving a tangible connection to the extraordinary moment when the region welcomed the world.

Other sculptures will enter public and private collections, further extending the reach of the project and supporting its broader mission.

Through this work – supporting artists, funding arts education, sustaining nonprofit cultural programming, and expanding access to contemporary art – The Art of the Game shows what a global sporting event can leave behind when art is part of the plan.

Municipalities, counties, parks, museums and other civic or nonprofit cultural institutions can apply for a donated sculpture by contacting Robinson Holloway at robinson@arts14c.org or 917-859-4947.