Le origini della British Academy of Arts di Roma: alcune precisazioni storiche, nuove fonti documentarie, una nuova ipotesi. / The origins of the British Academy of Arts in Rome: new sources, some historical clarifications, and a new hypothesis.

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Pubblicato

2021-06-28

Fascicolo

Sezione

Saggi

DOI:

https://doi.org/10.13138/2039-2362/2601

Autori

  • Tiziano Casola Università G. D'Annunzio, Chieti.

Abstract

Il 1823 vide la fondazione della British Academy of Arts di Roma, in via di S. Isidoro, drawing class stabile, frutto della cooperazione tra i primi artisti inglesi giunti nell’Urbe dopo la Restaurazione. Tra fasi di totale abbandono e tentativi di rilancio, l’accademia sopravvisse per oltre un secolo e, progressivamente aperta anche ai non britannici, fu frequentata da diversi grandi nomi dell’Ottocento artistico europeo. In seguito alla dispersione dell’archivio accademico nel 1946, diversi sono stati i tentativi di ricostruire la storia dell’istituzione, inevitabilmente lacunosi e spesso inesatti. Grazie all’apporto di nuove fonti primarie, col presente saggio si vogliono fornire: una ricostruzione cronologica puntuale del processo di fondazione; un’identificazione degli artisti che presero parte alle prime attività; un’analisi della realtà concreta dell’istituzione ai suoi albori. In particolare, sulla base di un finora mai indagato legame tra la nuova accademia e la British Institution di Londra, sarà avanzata una nuova ipotesi sulle motivazioni del rapporto notoriamente conflittuale tra artisti anglo-romani e Royal Academy, la quale mai volle riconoscere la British Academy di Roma come sua succursale.

The year 1823 saw the foundation of the British Academy of Arts in Rome, in Via di S. Isidoro, a stable drawing class, the result of the cooperation between the first English artists who arrived in Rome after the Restoration. With phases of total abandonment and attempts to relaunch, the academy survived for over a century and, progressively accessible to non-British too, it was frequented by several great names of the European artistic 19th century. Following the dispersion of the academic archive in 1946, there have been several attempts to reconstruct the history of the institution, inevitably incomplete and often inaccurate. Thanks to the contribution of new primary sources, this essay aims to provide: a timely chronological reconstruction of the foundation process; an identification of the artists who took part in the first activities; an analysis of the concrete reality of the institution at its dawn. In particular, on the basis of a previously never investigated link between the new academy and the British Institution of London, a new hypothesis will be put forward on the motivations of the notoriously conflicting relationship between Anglo-Roman artists and the Royal Academy, which never wanted to recognize the British Academy of Rome as its branch.

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Biografia autore

Tiziano Casola, Università G. D'Annunzio, Chieti.

Attualmente: Dottorando in 'Cultural Heritage Studies' presso l'Università Gabriele D'Annunzio di Chieti.

 

Come citare

Casola, T. (2021). Le origini della British Academy of Arts di Roma: alcune precisazioni storiche, nuove fonti documentarie, una nuova ipotesi. / The origins of the British Academy of Arts in Rome: new sources, some historical clarifications, and a new hypothesis. Il Capitale Culturale. Studies on the Value of Cultural Heritage, (23), 493–528. https://doi.org/10.13138/2039-2362/2601