Enfilade

From the conference programme and ArtHist.net:

Marble as Device: Material to Surface / Il Marmo Come Dispositivo: Dalla Materia alla Superficie
Gallerie Nazionali di Arte Antica –Palazzo Barberini / Galleria Borghese, Rome, 10–11 October 2024

Organized by Adriano Aymonino, Geraldine Leardi, and Ariane Varela Braga

DAY 1 | Marble offers the ideal medium to investigate human dexterity in combining materiality and immaterial meanings. Frequently studied from various perspectives—from quarry extraction, distribution networks, and processing techniques, to aesthetic values and socio-cultural or olitical uses—more recently marble has been analysed as a powerful expressive medium straddling iconicity and aniconism, structure and ornament. Following on from the inaugural NeReMa meeting held in Rome in 2021, this study day will bring together international scholars to reflect on the theme of marble as ‘device’, a notion that allows an interdisciplinary approach to the study of this transversal artistic and architectural medium in the Mediterranean-European world: from the more concrete aspects of setting up the material components, to the intrinsic and expressive qualities of marble surfaces.

DAY 2 | ‘Device’ is a complex word, rich in possibilities, which allows broad interpretative approaches. The first part of this second study day will therefore be devoted to two less conventional subjects in the field of marble studies: ‘marbles and stones on paper’, focusing on an analysis of the famous manuscript Study of Many Stones by Pier Leone Ghezzi (1726), along with a discussion of works by contemporary artists who employ marble, or its conceptual bearings, as a ‘device’ for their creativity. The afternoon session will start with a roundtable addressing the launch of the volume La Galleria Borghese nei suoi marmi: Materia Colore Superficie (Allemandi), followed by a presentation of an ongoing digital project on ancient marbles and stones led by the Galleria Borghese. The day closes with a tribute to Raniero Gnoli, the founding father of modern studies on ancient marble, and a tour of the Galleria Borghese.

Registration is available through Eventbrite.

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Gallerie Nazionali di Arte Antica –Palazzo Barberini

9.00  Registration

9.30  Francesca Cappelletti and Geraldine Leardi — Welcome and Introduction

10.00  Struttura e Forma / Structure and Form
Modera: Alessandro Poggio
• Rafael Rosenberg — Book-Matching: Why Are Stone Slabs Laid Symmetrically, and since When?
• Ruggero Longo — Materia e forma: Superfici marmoree nel Mediterraneo medievale
• Silvia Pedone — ‘Le parole e i marmi’: Estetica e colore a Bisanzio

11.30  Pausa Caffè

12.00  Teoria e Percezione / Theory and Perception
Modera: Daniela del Pesco
• Joris van Gastel — Le piume del pavone: Verso un’estetica della ricezione del commesso marmoreo napoletano
• Marthe Kretzschmar — „Je feiner das Korn ist, desto vollkommener ist der Marmor“: Winckelmann’s Description of Marble between Aesthetics and Mineralogy

13.30  Pranzo

15.00  Materia e Superficie / Materiality and Surface
Modera: Sara Bova
• Vitale Zanchettin — Michelangelo, le verità della pietra: Architetture oltre la superficie
• Grégoire Extermann — Importazione o continuità? Il dispositivo ‘romano’ della Casa de Pilatos a Siviglia

16.00  Pausa Caffè

16.30  Trasformazione e Display / Transformation and Display
Modera: Anna Frasca-Rath
• Christine Casey — From Mountainside to Fireside: Supplying and Working Marble for the British Interior, 1700–1770
• Ariane Varela Braga — Il marmo in mostra tra fine Ottocento e inizio Novecento

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Galleria Borghese

10.00  Registration

10.20 Francesca Cappelletti and Geraldine Leardi — Welcome and Introduction

10.30  Nicola Samorì — Mal di pietra: Il corpo minerale tra geodi e fratture

11:00 Jo Stockham — Fluid Rock, Marble Stilled

11.30  Pausa Caffè

12.00  Adriano Aymonino — Rappresentare le pietre di Roma: Marmi su carta nel Settecento

12.30  Paolo Bertoncini Sabatini — Materia e significato: Il marmo in termini estetici e progettuali nell’allestimento di mostre temporanee

13.30  Pranzo

15.00  Tavola Rotonda | Presentazione del volume La Galleria Borghese nei suoi marmi. Materia Colore Superficie, a cura di Geraldine Leardi
Intervengono: Fabio Barry, Dario Gamboni, Lorenzo Lazzarini, Sophie Mouquin

17.00  Pausa Caffè

17.30  Geraldine Leardi e Adriano Aymonino — Presentazione del progetto di un database su litoteche storiche e marmi antichi

18.00  Proiezione del documentario | Le Pietre e le Parole: Ritratto di Raniero Gnoli, di Adriano Aymonino e Silvia Davoli + Q&A

18.30  Tour per conoscere i marmi della Galleria Borghese con Geraldine Leardi e Lorenzo Lazzarini