Helga Vockenhuber Unveils Monumental Sculpture Installation at Rome’s Pantheon for Jubilee 2025

To mark Jubilee Year 2025, the Pantheon in Rome is hosting a major new installation by Austrian sculptor Helga Vockenhuber. On display until September 16th, ‘Corona Gloriae’ is a striking series of seven larger-than-life bronze sculptures, conceived as fragments of a broken crown of thorns. Within the Pantheon’s sacred setting, the work reflects on pain, redemption, hope, and universal themes that resonate across time and faith.

Curated by Don Umberto Bordoni and Professor Giuseppe Cordoni, the exhibition is supported by the Direzione Musei Nazionali della Città di Roma, Pantheon e Castel Sant’Angelo, the Austrian Embassy to the Holy See, and the German Collection Wemhöner. ‘Corona Gloriae’ positions Vockenhuber’s work within one of the most iconic monuments in Rome at the intersection of contemporary art and historic sacred space.

It’s a crown of thorns, composed of seven bronze sculptures that, beginning with the Passion of Jesus, evoke (in the artist’s vision) the drama of human existence reconciled through the sacrifice of Christ. In the context of the Jubilee Year, Vockenhuber’s installation seeks to spark reflection on the language of contemporary Christian art and the possibility that the saving Passion of Christ still represents, for a world marked by suffering and in search of redemption, the epiphany of an invincible hope.