Navigating through Byzantine Italy: an online catalogue for the knowledge and enhancement of a submerged artistic heritage
Year 2020
The project was awarded a PRIN 2017 grant.
The artistic heritage of Byzantine mobile objects preserved in museums and churches in Italy is very rich. But these works, scattered throughout the country, form a not very visible and, in a certain sense, submerged network, knowledge of which is partial.
The primary objective of the project is the creation of an online database in which will be catalogued the objects exhibited to the public in our peninsula, within the chronological limits of the Byzantine Millennium (330-1453 AD). This general corpus - so far lacking - will make it possible to reconstruct a phenomenon of Mediterranean artistic circulation that has determined the transmission of culture and visual models between East and West.
In addition to the database, two other products are planned: an institutional workshop; a historical-critical volume.
There are four purposes for the research:
- scientific, for the advancement of historical and artistic knowledge
- cultural-tourism, for museums and the territory
- didactics, for universities and schools
- for the management of works of art.
The whole research group is composed of four Units (Sapienza University of Rome; University Roma Tre; IULM University; University of Salento) with twenty university scholars and four young researchers/fellows to be recruited.
The research will promote the enhancement of cultural identity and cooperation between universities, schools and museums.