The Olympic Museum (french: Musée olympique) in

Lausanne Lausanne ( , , , ) ; it, Losanna; rm, Losanna. is the capital and largest city of the Swiss French speaking canton of Vaud. It is a hilly city situated on the shores of Lake Geneva, about halfway between the Jura Mountains and the Alps, and fac ...

, Switzerland houses permanent and temporary exhibits relating to sport and the Olympic movement. With more than 10,000 artifacts, the museum is the largest archive of

Olympic Games The modern Olympic Games or Olympics (french: link=no, Jeux olympiques) are the leading international sporting events featuring summer and winter sports competitions in which thousands of athletes from around the world participate in a multi ...

in the world and one of Lausanne's prime tourist site draws attracting more than 250,000 visitors each year. The Olympic Museum and the Olympic Park (sculpture garden between the museum and Lake Léman) are located at Ouchy, south of Lausanne. The headquarters of the

International Olympic Committee The International Olympic Committee (IOC; french: link=no, Comité international olympique, ''CIO'') is a non-governmental sports organisation based in Lausanne, Switzerland. It is constituted in the form of an association under the Swis ...

(IOC) are located at

Vidy Vidy is an area of the city of Lausanne (Switzerland), on the shores of Lake Geneva (french: lac Léman). Since 1968, the headquarters of the International Olympic Committee have been at Vidy. The Olympic Museum and the Olympic Park (sculptu ...

, to the west of Ouchy.

History

The museum was founded on 23 June 1993, on the initiative of then-president of the IOC

Juan Antonio Samaranch Juan Antonio Samaranch y Torelló, 1st Marquess of Samaranch (Catalan: ''Joan Antoni Samaranch i Torelló'', ; 17 July 1920 – 21 April 2010) was a Spanish sports administrator under the Franco regime (1973–1977) who served as the seventh P ...

. Mexican architect Pedro Ramírez Vázquez, an

member, and Jean-Pierre Cahen, were in charge of the project. The museum was named the European Museum of the Year in 1995. After 23 months of renovation between 2012 and 2013, the Olympic Museum re-opened on 21 December 2013. During the transformations of the building, a temporary exhibition was set up in a boat (''Helvétie'') of the CGN, in front of the Olympic Park. With the renovation, the surface of the museum increased from (in 2011) to (in 2013).

Exhibits

The permanent exhibition is organized into three major themes on three separate floors: Olympic World, Olympic Games, and Olympic Spirit. A visit begins on the third floor, where the Olympic World part of the exhibition informs visitors of the history of the ancient Olympic Games and the rebirth of the modern Games in the 19th century. Highlights include a display of Olympic torches, as well as a video documenting major moments in the history of opening ceremonies history. The second floor focuses on Olympic Games. Sporting equipment for a variety of sports are on display, and visitors are introduced to the

Youth Olympic Games The Youth Olympic Games (YOG) is an international multi-sport event for athletes between 15 and 18 years old, organized by the International Olympic Committee. The games are held every four years in staggered summer and winter events consisten ...

and the

Paralympic Games The Paralympic Games or Paralympics, also known as the ''Games of the Paralympiad'', is a periodic series of international multisport events involving athletes with a range of physical disabilities, including impaired muscle power and impaire ...

. More than 1,000 video clips of Olympic Games events and athletes can be searched and viewed at individual viewing stations. The final part of the permanent exhibit covers the Olympic Spirit, where visitors are made to feel part of an Olympic Village and can test their balance, agility, and mental skills with interactive exercises. Olympic medals are also on display. The renovated museum also includes a temporary exhibit space, where the museum regularly hosts traveling exhibits.

Olympic Park

The Olympic Museum is surrounded by a park containing numerous works of art on the theme of sports. Among the most notable works of art in the museum's permanent collection are the French sculptors Auguste Rodin's ''The American Athlete'' and

Niki de Saint Phalle Niki de Saint Phalle (; born Catherine Marie-Agnès Fal de Saint Phalle; 29 October 193021 May 2002) was a French-American sculptor, painter, filmmaker, and author of colorful hand-illustrated books. Widely noted as one of the few female monum ...

's ''Les Footballeurs'', the

Luxembourg Luxembourg ( ; lb, Lëtzebuerg ; french: link=no, Luxembourg; german: link=no, Luxemburg), officially the Grand Duchy of Luxembourg, ; french: link=no, Grand-Duché de Luxembourg ; german: link=no, Großherzogtum Luxemburg is a small land ...

ish sculptor Lucien Wercollier's tribute to the

pole vault Pole vaulting, also known as pole jumping, is a track and field event in which an athlete uses a long and flexible pole, usually made from fiberglass or carbon fiber, as an aid to jump over a bar. Pole jumping competitions were known to the My ...

titled ''Altius'', the Colombian sculptor Fernando Botero's ''Jeune Fille a la Balle'', and a kinetic art sculpture by the Swiss sculptor Jean Tinguely which combines a hockey stick, a boar's head, and a motorbike wheel.

Gallery

File:Losanna, museo olimpico, ext., 00.JPG, From the shores of Lake Léman File:Olympic Flames.jpg, Olympic torches inside the museum (before the transformation of the museum) File:Losanna, museo olimpico, int, sala 04.JPG, Inside the museum (after the transformation) File:Flamme olympique Lausanne.jpg, The Olympic Flame File:Picswiss VD-46-60.jpg, ''

Non-Violence Nonviolence is the personal practice of not causing harm to others under any condition. It may come from the belief that hurting people, animals and/or the environment is unnecessary to achieve an outcome and it may refer to a general philosoph ...

'' sculpture in the Olympic Park File:Lausanne MO.jpg, Statue in front of the museum, on the shore of Lake Léman File:Olympic Museum on MS Helvétie.jpg, During the transformations of the building (until December 2013), a temporary exhibition is set up in this CGN boat, in front of the Olympic Park File:Cyclistes - Gabor Mihaly.jpg, ''Cyclistes'', sculpture by Gabor Mihaly

Notes and references

External links

*
Page on the website of the City of LausanneOlympic Museum
within

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