MUSEOLOGY
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- Versione italiana
- Academic year
- 2022/2023
- Teacher
- GIANLUCA FORGIONE
- Credits
- 6
- Curriculum
- ARCHEOLOGIA E ARTI
- Didactic period
- Secondo Semestre
- SSD
- L-ART/04
Training objectives
- FROM THINGS TO MEN. STORIES OF MUSEUMS, EXHIBITIONS AND COLLECTORS IN MODERN EUROPE
At the end of the Course, students will be able to
- critically frame the main points of the History of Collecting and Museology;
- historically contextualise the birth and development of the phenomenon of Old Master exhibitions;
- recognise the cultural specificity of historical collections and the critical value of collecting and museological choices in modern and contemporary times;
- describe, with command of language, the transformation of the Museum’s function and meaning;
- apply what learnt during visits to cultural sites in Emilia Romagna. Prerequisites
- No prerequisites, other than the knowledge required for admission to the Course of Study.
Course programme
- The course aims to provide the basic outlines of the History of collecting and Museology. After a few introductory lectures devoted to the tools and methods of the discipline, the course will illustrate in depth the phenomenon of Collecting in the modern age: the emergence of Renaissance art collections and Studioli, the Wunderkammern, noble collections in the Baroque age and the birth of the public museum in the 18th century. The main types and functions of the modern museum will also be discussed. Particular attention will be paid to the relationship between museums and citizenship and thus to the link between cultural heritage and democracy. Some lectures will then be dedicated to the History of protection and the problems of Conservation, Management and Valorisation of cultural heritage.
The second part of the course will instead focus on the birth and evolution of the phenomenon of Old Master exhibitions: from Baroque Rome to Enlightenment Paris, from Fascist Italy to the today’s exhibition projects, which are not infrequently driven by commercial motivations rather than by scientific rigour and the need for research.
The students will be involved in workshop activities and visits to the main museums in Emilia Romagna. Didactic methods
- Frontal lectures supported by PowerPoint slides, seminars held by international scholars and curators, workshop activities and visits to cultural sites in Emilia Romagna. Lessons will be recorded and available via Google Classroom.
Learning assessment procedures
- A four-question oral examination that will last a maximum of twenty minutes. The exam will ascertain the critical understanding of the topics discussed during the course and in the reference bibliography. Particular attention will be paid to: the level of knowledge of the theoretical aspects; the independent judgement with which the student will be able to interpret the relationship between the History of collecting and Museology; the command of language with which the student will be able to express the acquired knowledge and skills. The final grade will be expressed in thirtieths.
Reference texts
- - Maria Teresa Fiorio, Il museo nella storia. Dallo studiolo alla raccolta pubblica, Milano, Mondadori, 2018 (first edition 2011);
- Francis Haskell, La nascita delle mostre. I dipinti degli antichi maestri e l’origine delle esposizioni d’arte, Milano, Skira, 2008 (italian translation of The Ephemeral Museum. Old Master Paintings and the Rise of the Art Exhibition, New Haven, Yale Univerity Press, 2000).
* The 6 CFU examination programme includes Maria Teresa Fiorio’s text only.
In-depth Bibliography (optional):
- Culture in mostra. Poetiche e politiche dell’allestimento museale, a cura di Ivan Karp, Steven D. Lavine; introduzione di Fredi Drugman, Bologna, Clueb, 1995 (traduzione italiana di Exhibiting Cultures. The Poetics and Politics of Museum Display, edited by Ivan Karp and Steven D. Lavine, Washington and London, Smithsonian Institution Press, 1991);
- Cristina De Benedictis, Per la storia del collezionismo italiano. Fonti e documenti, Firenze, Ponte alle Grazie, 1991 (and subsequent editions and reprints):
- Lorenzo Carletti, Cristiano Giometti, Raffaello on the road. Rinascimento e propaganda fascista in America (1938-40), Roma, Carocci, 2016;
- Tomaso Montanari, Vincenzo Trione, Contro le mostre, Torino, Einaudi, 2017.
