Academy of Fine Arts in Rome
Curriculum A Tools, methods and new technologies for artistic production
Anna Eleonora Fabrizi
The Bratto cradle, between tradition and innovation
Designers and artists in dialogue with craftsmanship and rural areas.
• Introduction: in 2019, I ran 13 art, design and craft workshops in Lunigiana, engaging with local residents and students, in order to rediscover a wooden artefact, the Bratto cradle, made using the interlocking technique by shepherds/craftsmen until around 1850.
As originally envisioned, the Bratto cradle project could have launched a series of workshops where participants could experiment with biomaterials and new technologies, reviving traditional craftsmanship. Tradition represents a link with the local area and its roots; as well as being a symbol of the rebirth of small, now-deserted villages, it had a wealth of stories to tell and was capable of inspiring emotion.
The cradle has some interesting features; it was constructed using interlocking joints without a single nail, the red colour was derived from beech sap, whilst the symbols shown above served as a charm to ward off evil. Not much remains of the traditional method of making it; it was produced by shepherds who, during the winter, became skilled craftsmen but relied entirely on the oral transmission of their knowledge. Its shape is rather unusual compared to other cradles, as it tilts lengthways. There are similar forms in the 1400s, as can be seen from a painting by Piero della Francesca, and later some traces are found in various engravings, but then nothing more, and the question is why it made its way to the ridge between Emilia and Tuscany to be reproduced.
• Focus: starting from the Bratto cradle, craftsmanship and biomaterials, I would like to analyse a microcosm in order to create a sort of case study that can be replicated in various contexts, particularly in rural areas with a strong manufacturing tradition. I would like to explore a social and creative initiative in which the creative spark is unleashed by artists, designers and visionaries, and, starting this summer, to organise artist residencies in Lunigiana that will spark reflection on craftsmanship and the regeneration of small villages.
Drawing on the writings of Ugo La Pietra, the aim is to create a social and inclusive initiative that goes hand in hand with exemplary productions. I would also like to contribute to the creation of a directory of craft businesses, particularly in rural areas, where designers or artists have offered a glimpse of possibilities that differ from those usually pursued.
Anna Eleonora Fabrizi – My background is partly in business and partly in the arts: these are two very different fields which I have sought to harmonise in my design pieces and my paintings, where I aim to blend my interest in nature and colour with the rigour of geometric forms.
I am interested in exploring the connection with the local area and its materials: this is why I have worked on projects that encourage interaction between the environment, artists and craftspeople, including social design projects and artist residencies, in which I explore the relationship between the local area and craftsmanship. I am fascinated by the craftsmanship and expressive ability of artists who work in close contact with nature.
I live and work in Carrara, where I create marble objects, paper sculptures and illustrations.
Davide Lunerti
The focus of his research is science fiction imagery in feminist literature and emerging queer art. From second-wave feminism to 21st-century feminist movements and queer theories, the project explores, more specifically, the relationship between speculative writing, critical writing and the visual arts, tracing a history of techniques and iconography.
Davide Lunerti (Rome, 1995) is a curator and researcher. He studied Cultural Heritage at the University of Bologna and Visual Cultures and Curatorial Practices at the Brera Academy. In 2024, he worked as a resident curator at the La Quadriennale Foundation in Rome. The exhibitions he has curated include: Ultraqueer (Palazzo Merulana, 2022), Rivoluzionari3 (Mattatoio, 2023), Queer Pandemia (BASE Milano, 2023), Il diavolo mangia zuppa calda (Palazzo Lucarini, 2025).
Mattia Cleri Polidori
Emergences
Morphogenesis in contemporary art
The “Emergenze” research project explores the role of emergence and the recognition of patterns based on the golden ratio in contemporary aesthetics. The spontaneous organisation of matter in space, morphogenesis, has implications that branch out in many directions. Starting with Alan Turing’s studies on morphogenesis and Benoît Mandelbrot’s mathematics of fractals, moving on to Lee Smolin’s approach to quantum gravity, and culminating in the philosophical theories of Graham Harman, the emergence of golden patterns creates a rhizome of connections within contemporary thought. The project presented here aims to navigate this archipelago of ideas from an aesthetic perspective; in other words, to explore pattern recognition and its application in contemporary art, through both traditional media and new technologies, with a particular focus on interdisciplinary practices.
The primary aim of the project is to analyse the processes that give rise to these patterns. Morphogenesis is a process governed by simple laws, yet one which leads to unpredictable outcomes; in other words, it is a form of order that allows for the possibility of chaos. Ultimately, the project aims to demonstrate that the organisation of matter reveals something about the form of the space-time fabric. As a result, aesthetic processes based on the emergence and recognition of patterns reveal something of the hidden behaviour of space-time. Through this interpretation, the work of art becomes a gnoseological device.
The project proposes parallel operational methodologies to address the issue of form from different perspectives, with a view to developing new languages and media that incorporate both aesthetic and scientific practices. The research and experimental methods include interviews, seminars and workshops, the drafting of a critical analysis and a research archive, and the creation of a body of work. The practical and theoretical results of the project will be presented at a closing conference.
Mattia Cleri Polidori was born in Rome in 1987. He graduated in Painting from the Academy of Fine Arts in Rome in 2015. In 2016, he obtained a Master’s degree in Painting from Wimbledon College of Arts in London. He is one of the six founders of the contemporary art workshop “Rione Placido”, which opened in January 2023. His research is based on the golden patterns that emerge in morphogenesis, the way in which matter organises itself autonomously in space. Through the isolation and presentation of natural objects, he explores this behaviour of matter using a wide range of techniques, from oil painting and moulding with rubber, resin and concrete, to time-based media. Notable among his recent projects are his exhibitions at Cartavetra in Florence in 2024 and 2021, and at Blocco 13 in Rome in 2023; his collaboration with the DOM theatre company on the production “CAMPFIRE – dove comincia l’incendio” at the Teatro India in Rome; and his artist residencies in Estonia in 2020 and 2022.
Maria Giovanna Sodero
Would cinema survive if we all became visually impaired from tomorrow?
This interdisciplinary research explores altered visual perception from scientific, philosophical and artistic perspectives. By analysing the optical effects of various eye conditions, the thesis reconstructs the characteristics of impaired visual perception. Using audiovisual language, the aim is to explore not only the areas of blindness and the loss of information, but also the unexpected creative potential that can emerge from these perceptual limitations.
Maria Giovanna Sodero 1991, lives in Rome; she is a visual artist, filmmaker and photographer. She graduated in New Artistic Languages from the Academy of Fine Arts in Rome. She is currently a doctoral student at the same Academy. She attends the cinematography workshop at the Centro sperimentale di cinematografia with Giuseppe Lanci. She has taken part in several artist residencies. Her work has been exhibited in Rome, Florence, Venice, Lecce, Arles (FR), Belgium and China, and her short films have been selected for several Italian festivals. She participated in the In Progress film development project, with Michelangelo Frammartino, presenting her documentary project during the Giornate degli Autori in Venice. She won the award for best short film in the Laboratorio di Cinema del Reale – Laguna Sud 2023, with Zalab and under the supervision of Andrea Segre. She took part as a director in the Becoming Maestre project by Netflix, David di Donatello, Accademia Nazionale di cinema. Finalist at the Premio Nazionale delle Arti ’21. Co-founder of the video-making collective Circa.Studio, collaborating with productions such as INDEX, theatre companies such as Muta Imago, and as part of the Short Theatre festival. Working with schools, they organise audiovisual and art workshops for students.
Enrico Vezzi
Opposite Directions: Survival strategies for independent artistic and curatorial practices — Can the artists-run space model – or independent artistic and curatorial activities – help to establish a sustainable counterpoint to cultural management policies or socio-economic policies relating to the arts? Spaces and initiatives run by artists have always played a significant role in the cultural landscape of Italy and Europe, and this project aims to explore the possibility of creating a new platform that brings together and highlights the various non-profit and self-managed contemporary art organisations in Italy, linking them with their European counterparts, thereby facilitating the pooling of financial resources and the exchange of experiences and knowledge.
Enrico Vezzi (San Miniato, 1979) — Graduated in Psychology from the University of Florence in 2005. From the very beginning of his career, he has viewed art as a means of stimulating new reflections on the relationship between nature, collective history and personal memory. His work has featured in collective and personal projects in institutional spaces in Italy and abroad, including: Ex-Tech Center, Düsseldorf (2023); Tenuta dello Scompiglio, Lucca (2022); La Portineria, Florence (2022); Hangar, Barcelona (2021); Artists for Staccioli (2020); Palazzo Grassi, Venice (2017); Meštrovicev paviljon, Zagreb (2017); Centrale Fies, Trento (2016); Gallerie SeeStudio, Paris (2015); DC, Pordenone (2013); Parco della Musica, Rome (2013); Fondazione March, Padua, (2012); Museo di Villa Croce, Genoa (2012); CCCStrozzina, Florence (2009). Alongside his exhibition work, he has led workshops, lectures and talks in collaboration with: AAA in Brussels, Radar in Loughborough, Fabrica de Pensule in Cluj-Napoca, the International Academy in Hengshui, Careof in Milan, Bevilacqua La Masa in Venice, Fondazione Fotografia in Modena, Neon Campobase in Bologna, and the MIC Museum in Faenza. Since 2008, he has been an active member of the Base/Progetti per l’arte collective in Florence. Since 2019, he has been one of the founders of the Estuario project space in Prato. Since 2021, he has been one of the curators of the Imboscata project. Since 2023, he has been the creator and curator of the Conterranei project in Pistoia.
Curriculum B Tools, methods and new technologies for the communication of the visual arts
Maria Teresa Coppola
Building a visual memory through the Photographic Archive of the Istituto Nazionale di Studi Romani. Cataloguing, digitisation and promotion of a section of the collection. The project aims to catalogue, digitise and promote a collection of more than 10,000 early 20th-century glass plate slides, held at the Istituto Nazionale di Studi Romani. With the aim of complementing and supporting practical work, this theoretical research reconstructs the history of the Photo Library, analyses and develops its archival aspects, and examines the role of digital technology as a tool for the transmission of historical knowledge. The aim is twofold: to preserve the photographic heritage and make it accessible to the public; and to create a Digital Storytelling pathway that places the slides analysed in their relational context.
Maria Teresa Coppola (Catania, 1998) – graduated in Modern Literature from the University of Milan, specialising in Contemporary Italian Literature. Wishing to explore cultural communication in greater depth, she continued her studies at the Università Cattolica del Sacro Cuore in Milan, where she completed a Level II Master’s degree in Museology, Museography and Cultural Heritage Management, whilst collaborating with the Braidense National Library on the curation of two exhibitions: Manzoni 1873–2023. La peste “orribile flagello” tra vivere e scrivere (2023) and Baj. Libri in libertà (2024). She was awarded her Master’s degree after submitting a thesis analysing the educational services offered by two house-museums dedicated to two Milanese poets: Alessandro Manzoni and Giovanni Testori. In the 2023–2024 academic year, she devoted herself to teaching literature to second-year students at a secondary school in Monza. She is currently enrolled on the 40th cycle of the doctoral course in Cultures, Practices and Communications in the Visual Arts at the Academy of Fine Arts in Rome – Programme B: TOOLS, METHODS AND NEW TECHNOLOGIES FOR THE COMMUNICATION OF THE VISUAL ARTS in collaboration with the Istituto Nazionale di Studi Romani.
Martina Di Gennaro
The notebook, in its liminal meaning in relation to the private sphere, is a potential corridor of access to a dimension of the study of artistic practice that goes beyond the mechanics of exhibition, of the “public”, to provide an authentic view of the process of creative conception. The research aims to investigate the conceptual and design dimension of contemporary artistic creation, with the goal of creating a digital archive of notebooks by contemporary artists that promotes their documentation and conservation.
Martina Di Gennaro (Naples, 1994) – A doctoral student at the Academy of Fine Arts in Rome, she obtained a Level I Diploma in Painting and a Level II Diploma in Artistic Graphic Design from the Academy of Fine Arts in Naples, where she is a Subject Specialist for the courses in Artistic Graphic Design, Experimental Printing Techniques and Woodcut alongside A. Brusca (2019–2021). Since 2020, she has been living and working in Rome, where she devotes herself to research, focusing on the study and archiving of documents relating to artistic conception and design in the contemporary art scene. Since 2023, she has been a permanent lecturer in
Graphic and Painting Arts. In 2024, she was artist-in-residence at the Fondazione Il Bisonte in Florence. In the field of graphic art, she has taken part in various group exhibitions in Italy, France, the United Kingdom and Portugal. Since 2018, one of her works has been on permanent display in the Naples Metro collection.
martina.digennaro@studenti.abaroma.it
Francesco Giovanetti
Immersive Narratives and Interactive Design: Cultural Heritage through Digital Media.
The project was born from a reflection on new artistic languages within the fields of media and visual culture, from an interdisciplinary perspective applied to the communication of cultural heritage, exploring how this can be organised, supported and made more fluid by the various innovative technological tools currently available.
Focusing on the function and possibilities of new media in the context of promoting cultural heritage, it aims to examine the intersections and different communication possibilities offered by gamification, with particular attention to narrative and gameplay design to optimise the immersive and interactive experience in the museum environment.
Francesco Giovanetti (Rome, 1995) is a doctoral student and subject specialist in Contemporary Museology at the Academy of Fine Arts in Rome.
Since 2019, he has been working in curation and cultural planning, gaining experience at institutions such as the National Gallery of Modern and Contemporary Art, the Carlo Bilotti Museum, the Palazzo delle Esposizioni and the Ennio Morricone Auditorium at the Parco della Musica in Rome.
In March 2022, he obtained a Second-Level Diploma in Communication and Promotion of Contemporary Artistic Heritage from the Academy of Fine Arts in Rome and, as a subject specialist, he furthered his study of museology and the role of museums not only as venues for exhibition and conservation, but as dynamic spaces that are crucial to the construction of knowledge and social dialogue.
In 2024, she was awarded the doctoral scholarship for Cultures, Practices and Communications in the Visual Arts, co-funded by Kabuto Srl.
Chiara Guidoni
Visual Arts Communication and New Technologies in Art: An Analysis of the Origins of the CAMP Colonna Art Museum in Pescara
The proposed research project aims to explore the intersection between visual arts communication and the use of new technologies in the context of the creation of a new museum of contemporary art, the CAMP Colonna Art Museum in Pescara. The research focuses on analysing the processes of development, promotion and engagement with the visual arts through the integration of digital technologies, with a particular focus on augmented and virtual reality, as well as interactive and immersive installations.
The main aim is to understand how new technologies can influence and enhance artistic communication, both from a curatorial perspective and in terms of the visitor experience. The CAMP Colonna Art Museum in Pescara is an ideal case study, as it is an emerging institution with a strong focus on technological innovation; it also offers a packed programme of exhibitions, events, residencies and programmes, which would provide an opportunity to analyse the application of new technologies in various fields of contemporary culture.
Chiara Guidoni (Chiusi (SI), 1991) lives in Perugia, where she opened a contemporary art gallery, Indigo Art Gallery, in 2021. She is an art historian who graduated from the University of Florence with a thesis on iconography and iconology entitled “Il Poema della Vita umana” by Giulio Aristide Sartorio and the issues surrounding decorative art; she is currently a doctoral student at the Academy of Fine Arts in Rome. She works as an independent curator and critic with Italian and international artists.
Marianna Pontillo
Communication as Culture – A shared project between the Academy of Fine Arts in Rome and Azienda Speciale Palaexpo
The research project aims to encourage a transformation of the role of communication in cultural venues: from a technical tool for dissemination to a project for the promotion of cultural organisations, a defining and professionalising element, and a point of connection between the institution and the socio-cultural landscape in which it is embedded. Building on a theoretical study, the research aims to find practical application in the collaboration between the Academy of Fine Arts in Rome and the Azienda Speciale Palaexpo at the former slaughterhouse site in Rome, through the proposal of a shared project in what is set to become the capital’s new City of the Arts of the capital.
Marianna Pontillo (Rome, 1997) is a doctoral student and collaborator for the Communications Office at the Academy of Fine Arts in Rome.
Since 2019, she has been working in Communication and Cultural Planning, gaining experience at institutions such as the National Gallery of Modern and Contemporary Art in Rome and the Carlo Bilotti Museum in Rome. In March 2022, she obtained a Second-Level Diploma in Communication and Promotion of Contemporary Artistic Heritage from the Academy of Fine Arts in Rome and immediately joined theCommunication Office of the institution itself, where she is responsible for managing communication channels with the aim of promoting the academy from a communication and cultural point of view.
In 2024, she was awarded the doctoral scholarship for Cultures, Practices and Communications in the Visual Arts, co-funded by Azienda Speciale Palaexpo.