Dr. des. Davide Ferri

Davide Ferri (he/him) is a historian of art and visual and material culture specializing in the early modern period. His transdisciplinary research combines postcolonial and ecocritical approaches to investigate the politics of images, territoriality, the interactions between images and social actors, and processes of environmental transformation in the early modern world, particularly in the Mediterranean and its global entanglements, while also engaging critically with the historiography of art history. He is currently revising his dissertation into the monograph Territorial Aesthetics: Genoa’s Visual Politics across Mediterranean Ecologies, 1625–1655. A specialist in early modern Genoa, his current research further explores the visual and material histories of port labour, Maghrebi–Aegean connections across the Mediterranean, historical images and models of cities, and the methodological possibilities of practicing art history as maritime history.

He earned his Ph.D. in Art History and Interdisciplinary Cultural Studies from the University of Bern in 2026 (Dr. des.), with his dissertation receiving the Faculty of Humanities’ annual Prize for the Best Doctoral Dissertation, and holds B.A. and M.A. degrees in Art and Visual History (Bildgeschichte) and Archaeology from Humboldt University of Berlin. Since August 2026, he has been a Postdoctoral Researcher in the Department of Early Modern Art History at the University of Bern. He is also an Associate Scholar at the Kunsthistorisches Institut in Florenz – Max-Planck-Institut, where he was Doctoral Fellow and Academic Assistant to the Director (2019–2023) before serving as Head of the Research Coordination and Public Relations unit (2023–2026).

His research has been supported by the Max Planck Society, the DAAD, the Swiss-European Mobility Programme, the Walter Benjamin Kolleg, the Académie de France à Rome – Villa Médicis, among other institutions, and has been recognized with the Early Career Prize of the Swiss Association of Art Historians (2025). Prior to his doctorate, he gained curatorial and museum experience at the Humboldt Forum Foundation and in Berlin-based galleries specializing in East Asian art. He has long been engaged in academic citizenship and self-governance, serving in student and doctoral representative roles and, since 2021, as a member of the Editorial Board of ArtHist.net, reflecting his commitment to an open, collaborative, and internationally connected discipline.