Florentine Provenances.
The Circulation of Cultural Assets in Florence, 20th-21st Centuries

The workshop focuses on the city of Florence as a site of circulation and translocation of cultural assets from 1922 to the present day. Renowned hub for art lovers and dealers from all over Europe and the US since the 19th century, during these decades Florence-based cultural assets experienced an unprecedented level of exchange, displacement or outright looting that affected especially Jewish citizens but also political opponents and expats communities. Putting the objects themselves at the centre of the enquiry – not only artworks but also books, archives, ceremonial objects, Judaica, Hebraica, music instruments, furniture, etc. –, the two-day workshop revolves around the Florentine case study in order to inquire into how and to which extent material culture shaped and was shaped by specific events, actors and networks active in Florence.

PROGRAMME

Monday, 10 November 2025

14.00 – 14.30 Welcome and Opening remarks

Alice Cazzola (Kunsthistorisches Institut in Florenz – Max-Planck-Institut; University of Heidelberg) & Bianca Gaudenzi (SAGAS, University of Florence; Wolfson College, University of Cambridge)

14.30 – 16.00
Panel I: New Voices from the Archives: art market and connoisseurship
Chair: Joanna Smalcerz (University of Warsaw; Kunsthistorisches Institut in Florenz - Max-Planck-Institut)

Antonio Marras (Bardini Heritage Historical Archive)
The Antiquarian Activity of Ugo Bardini: Unpublished Archival Sources and Research Perspectives

Louise Arizzoli & Marta Binazzi (I Tatti, the Harvard University Center for Italian Renaissance Studies) 
Florentine Provenances in the Photo-Archive: Bernard and Mary Berenson’s International Network 

16.00 – 16.30 COFFEE BREAK

16.30 - 18.00
Panel II: Between musico- and bibliophilia: tracing provenances of musical instruments and books
Chair: Alice Cazzola

Camilla Musci (École Pratique des Hautes Études Paris; Kunsthistorisches Institut in Florenz – Max-Planck-Institut)
From Saba’s Library to the Serlupiana Collection: The Journey of a Literary Legacy

Luna Silvestri (Association Musique & Spoliations)
Provenance Research on The Wartime Spoliation of Musical Instruments in Italy

18.00 – 20.00 Afternoon break (Internal meeting of the Working Group Italy)
21.00 Dinner (self-funded)

Tuesday 11 November 2025

9.30 – 11.30
Panel III: Provenance as expression of cultural intent
Chair: Cristiano Giometti (SAGAS, University of Florence)

Lynn Catterson (Columbia University New York)
Ugo Bardini and his many layers of provenance information 

Fiona Ricklow (Independent art and architectural historian, London)
Florentine Provenance and Private Collecting: The Schroders and the Legacy of the Renaissance

Mariaelena Floriani (Università di Genova; St Andrews University)
The Sanford Lost Collection. Florentine Provenances from 1832 to the present

11.30 – 12.00 COFFEE BREAK

12.00 – 13.30 Provenance research through photographs. Insights into the holdings of the Photothek of the Kunsthistorisches Institute in Florenz
Almut Goldhahn (Kunsthistorisches Institut in Florenz – Max-Planck-Institut) (limited places, for speakers and chairs only)           

13.30 – 14.45 LUNCH BREAK (self-funded)

14.45 – 16.45 Final roundtable (Casa Zuccari, via Giusti 49)
Beyond Florence: the circulation of cultural objects in Italy, 20^th and 21^st centuries
Chair: Bianca Gaudenzi

• Donata Levi (Università degli Studi di Udine)
• Christian Fuhrmeister (LMU München; Zentralinstitut für Kunstgeschichte)
• Emanuele Pellegrini (Scuola IMT Alti Studi Lucca)
• Gerhard Wolf (Kunsthistorisches Institut in Florenz – Max-Planck-Institut)

NB different venue: Casa Zuccari, via Giusti 49 (no zoom connection)

All participants are warmly invited to continue the conversation at the opening event of the exhibition “Armin Linke: The City as Archive. Florence” curated by Hannah Baader and Costanza Caraffa, Kunsthistorisches Institut in Florenz, Max-Planck-Institut, Palazzo Budini Grifoni Gattai, via dei Servi 51, from 5 pm onward: https://www.khi.fi.it/de/aktuelles/ausstellungen/20251111-city-as-archive.php