High atop the windswept viewing platform of Gediminas Hill, a new resident now looks out over the red-tiled roofs and soaring spires of Vilnius. Cast in solid bronze, life-sized, and standing with a raw, naturalistic weight, a lone wolf has taken up its post. The sculpture, created by the celebrated contemporary Italian artist Davide Rivalta, is far more than a striking public art installation; it is a physical bridge between the collective memories of two European capitals separated by thousands of kilometers but bound by a singular apex predator.
The placement of the sculpture on Gediminas Hill roots it to the very spot where the story of Vilnius began. According to Baltic lore, it was on this exact promontory that Grand Duke Gediminas lay down to sleep after a long hunt in the surrounding holy forests. In his sleep, he was visited by a vision of a massive iron wolf standing atop the hill, howling with the force of a hundred wolves. When the pagan priest Lizdeika interpreted the dream, he told the Duke that the wolf represented an impregnable castle and a city whose fame would echo across the civilized world. Gediminas built the wooden fortification that very year, establishing the seat of Lithuanian statehood.
By a striking twist of historical symmetry, Rome—the eternal source of Mediterranean empire—traces its own genesis to the wild wood. The Roman origin story is fundamentally inseparable from the Capitoline Wolf, the wild mother who discovered the abandoned twins Romulus and Remus along the banks of the Tiber River and nursed them to strength. By placing Rivalta’s bronze wolf on the observation deck of the National Museum of Lithuania’s most visited branch, the city visually marries the northern forest prophecy with the southern imperial myth.
Restoring the Interrupted Line
The unveiling ceremony on June 16 carried a profound diplomatic weight, specifically timed to celebrate the 35th anniversary of the re-establishment of diplomatic relations between Italy and Lithuania. The formal bonds between the two nations were abruptly severed during the dark decades of the Soviet occupation of the Baltic states, an administrative erasure that lasted until Lithuania courageously reclaimed its independence in 1990.
The project was brought to fruition through an intricate cultural coalition, conceived by the Italian Embassy in Vilnius and the National Museum of Lithuania, and promoted heavily by the Directorate-General for Contemporary Creativity of the Italian Ministry of Culture. Under the patronage of the Vilnius Club and in tandem with the Vilnius City Municipality, the installation serves as the emotional centerpiece for the ongoing Year of Lithuanian Culture in Italy.
During the formal unveiling, Emanuele de Maigret, Italy’s Ambassador to Lithuania, traced this modern diplomatic renewal back to the deep bedrock of European history:
“The installation of Davide Rivalta’s Wolf on Gediminas Hill offers a contemporary interpretation of the founding legends of Vilnius and Rome while highlighting centuries of cultural exchange between Italy and Lithuania. Our countries continue to evolve through art and shared heritage – from historic trade routes on the Amber Road during Roman times and Renaissance influences through Bona Sforza to Baroque artists that helped shape the UNESCO listed Vilnius Old Town. We are sincerely grateful to Lithuanian institutions for allowing Italy to place our artist’s work in such a symbolic site of Lithuanian statehood and culture…”
The Italian Chisel on Baltic Stone
While Rivalta’s bronze wolf represents a fresh, twenty-first-century intervention, the Italian artistic presence in Vilnius is sewn deeply into the very mortar of the city’s streets. Beginning in the sixteenth century, the Grand Duchy of Lithuania became a primary destination for a continuous migration of brilliant Italian architects, sculptors, plaster-masters, and painters who traveled north to transform a northern stronghold into a grand European capital.
Perhaps the most influential figure in this historical courtship was Bona Sforza, the fierce, Italian-born Grand Duchess of Lithuania and Queen of Poland. Arriving in the sixteenth century, she radically overhauled the political, culinary, economic, and cultural life of the Grand Duchy, introducing Renaissance manners, Italian court music, and southern architectural tastes. Today, her presence is still actively felt at the reconstructed Palace of the Grand Dukes of Lithuania, where visitors regularly gather in the adjacent Bona Sforza Square to view the intricate bas-relief dedicated to her sweeping historical legacy.
Following the Renaissance foundation, the seventeenth century saw Italian masters completely redefine the city’s skyline with the emotional theatricality of the Baroque. This legacy is preserved in its most breathtaking form within the Church of St. Peter and St. Paul in the Antakalnis district. Inside, the world dissolves into a dizzying white labyrinth of more than 2,000 individual stucco figures. Created by the Italian virtuosos Giovanni Pietro Perti and Giovanni Maria Galli, no two figures in the entire church are identical, a monumental feat of sculpture that renders it one of the most astonishing Baroque interiors on the European continent.
A short walk away stands the grand Pacai Palace, a historic aristocratic residence that once hosted Polish-Lithuanian monarchs and Napoleon Bonaparte, and has since been meticulously converted into a luxury hotel. The palace’s historic opulence was engineered directly by a triumvirate of seventeenth-century Italian talent: the master architect Giovanni Battista Frediani, the ubiquitous stucco-carver Giovanni Pietro Perti, and the painter Michelangelo Palloni, whose frescoed ceilings still look down upon modern travelers.
Stories That Outlast Empires
Davide Rivalta, born in Bologna and recognized across the globe for his powerful animal installations in cities like Dublin and Oslo, purposefully positions his beasts to challenge the rigid, cold geometry of modern urban design. By placing his bronze wolf directly on the ancient soil of Gediminas Hill, he forces an immediate dialogue between contemporary artistic texture and a heavily charged historic landscape.
The modern city cannot live on bread and infrastructure alone. As Vilnius Mayor Valdas Benkunskas observed during the opening ceremony, the life of a true European capital is sustained by the invisible weight of its symbols:
“This is where the story of Vilnius begins and where the city’s founding legend comes to life. It is fitting that a work connecting two European capitals will now welcome residents and visitors alike. Davide Rivalta’s ‘Wolf’ not only enriches Vilnius’ cultural landscape, but also reminds us that cities are shaped not only by architecture and history, but by symbols that continue to resonate today.”
When empires fall, and treaties are rewritten, it is the fundamental stories, the shared memories, and the ancient myths that endure. Through the dark centuries of occupation and the triumphant decades of renewal, the wolf has remained a constant protector of both Roman and Lithuanian identity. Cradled on the hill where a Grand Duke once dreamed of an unstoppable future, Rivalta’s bronze guardian stands as a beautiful reminder that Vilnius remains entirely, irrevocably open to the wider European soul.
