Experts debate which Olympics were the best designed, with Mexico City, Los Angeles, Barcelona, and Grenoble drawing enthusiastic advocates. But a consensus usually forms around the graphic program created for the 20th Olympiad held in Munich, West Germany, in 1972. Usually attributed to a single visionary creative director, Otl Aicher, the program was in fact created by a team of designers who worked tirelessly on every detail of it for nearly six years. The result was a fully coordinated, rigorously executed, totally comprehensive scheme that set a new standard for the design of the Games. It became an influential model not only for the design of sporting events but for comprehensive identity programs of any kind.

This exhibition highlights the program created for the 1972 Munich Olympics at its best, one for each event, each capturing both a moment in time and making a bid for permanence. Together, they demonstrate a magically calibrated balance of consistency and surprise, control and power, precision and exuberance: no less than the athletes they celebrate.

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