GIOVAN BATTISTA FIDANZA

Born in Perugia (Italy) in 1967

Department of Storia, Patrimonio Culturale, Formazione e Società (History, Cultural Heritage, Education and Society). 

University of Rome, Tor Vergata

Via Columbia, 1 - 00133 Rome, Italy / Phone: 0039 06 72595053 / e-mail: fidanza@lettere.uniroma2.it

QUALIFICATIONS

• 2002: PhD in History of Art, University of Perugia.

EMPLOYMENT

• 2018-present: Professor of History of Early Modern Art; University of Rome, Tor Vergata.

• 2006-2018: Associate Professor of History of Early Modern Art; University of Rome, Tor Vergata. 

• 2004-2006: Adjunct Professor of Technical Art History; University of Rome, Tor Vergata.

• 2003-2004: Adjunct Professor of Technical Art History; University of Perugia.

VISITING PROFESSORSHIPS

• 2013: Visiting Professor, Pennsylvania State University, Erie, The Behrend College within the course: Italian Renaissance Art of the School of Humanities and Social Sciences.

• 2011: Visiting Lecturer, Loughborough University (UK), School of the Arts, within the MA Art and Design Studio Practice course.

EDITORIAL BOARD MEMBERSHIPS

• 2019-2021: Co-Editor of Rivista d’Arte (first published 1903), Leo S. Olschki Publisher, Florence.

• 2011-2019: Member of the editorial board of Rivista d’Arte (first published 1903), Leo S. Olschki Publisher, Florence.

UNIVERSITY APPOINTMENTS AND RESPONSIBILITIES

• 2020-2022: Delegate of the Rector as Director of “Villa Mondragone”, a monumental complex (papal villa) owned by the University of Rome, Tor Vergata.

Ph.D PROGRAMME

• 2022-present: Director of the National Ph.D Programme in Cultural Heritage, University of Rome, Tor Vergata.

• 2018-2021: Director of the Ph.D Programme in Cultural Heritage, Education, and Geography (Beni Culturali, Formazione e Territorio), University of Rome, Tor Vergata.

• 2024 Hibernian Research Award - University of Notre Dame - Cushwa Center for the Study of American Catholicism (title of the project: “The Irish church of St. Isidore in Rome as a means of representing a great tradition: the rhetorical efficacy of the main eighteenth-century pictorial decorations”). 

• 2008-present: Co- Principal Investigator - together with Dr. Nicola Macchioni of CNR (National Research Council of Italy) - of the database "ArISStArt" (Archivio delle Identificazioni delle Specie Legnose dei Beni Storico-Artistici), a system that permits the information based management of the anatomical recognition of the wood species of wooden artworks. This project is in collaboration with the Istituto per la Valorizzazione del Legno e delle Specie Arboree (Trees and Timber Institute)-CNR, Florence, Italy. The database and the research are entirely financed by “Fondazione Guglielmo Giordano”.

• 2011-2016: Investigator, Research unit of University of Rome, Tor Vergata: PRIN (Programmi di Ricerca Scientifica di Rilevante Interesse Nazionale - Research Projects of Significant National Interest) funded by the Italian Ministry of University and Research. Title of project: La scultura lignea in Europa fra Rinascimento e Barocco. Circolazione di maestranze, modelli e materiali tra Italia, Spagna, Francia e Germania in association with: University of Perugia; University of Udine; University of Naples Suor Orsola Benincasa; University of Salento.

FELLOWSHIPS

• 2017-2018: Research fellow at CNR-Istituto per la Valorizzazione del Legno e delle Specie Arboree (National Research Council of Italy-Trees and Timber Institute). Field of research: diagnostics applied to wooden artworks (from February 2017 to February 2018).

MEMBERSHIP OF ADVISORY COMMITTEES

• Member of the Rome Advisory Committee of the Cushwa Center for the History of American Catholicism of the University of Notre Dame for the years 2024-2025 (invitation letter: 23 November 2023).

RECENT AND INTERNATIONAL CONFERENCE TALKS

• “Pharmacology and Art According to Cardinal Francesco Maria del Monte: Iconography and Materials” (Panel: Converging Realms: Art and Medicine through the Eyes of Patrons, Physicians, and Artists), presented at Annual Meeting of The Renaissance Society of America (Chicago, 21-23 March 2024).

• “The Pathological Anatomy of the Human Body: The Sorrowful Wooden Crucifixes of Seventeenth-Century Franciscan Sculptors in Rome and Lazio”, presented at Difficult Pasts (Liverpool, 19-22 July 2023), Society for Renaissance Studies Biennial Conference.

• “English Baroque Rome: Artists and Patrons”, presented at North Atlantic Catholic Communities in Rome, 1622-1939(Rome, 5-7 June 2017), international conference organized by University of Notre Dame. 

MAIN FIELDS OF RESEARCH

• History of art patronage in the early modern age, with particular reference to the Papal States. 

• History of wooden sculpture and furnishings in the Early modern period in Central Italy, in particular in the Papal States and Florence, with emphasis on stylistic and historical aspects of materials and techniques.

• Diagnostics applied to the study of wooden sculpture and painting in the Early modern period. 

• History of engraving from the 18th century to the early 19th century, with particular reference to Northern Italy: Milan and Parma.

MAIN RECENT PUBLICATIONS

Books

• G.B. Fidanza, Andrea Sacchi and Cardinal del Monte: the rediscovered frescoes in the Palazzo di Ripetta in Rome, London, Ad Ilissum, 2022, pages xii + 132.

Good reviews:

-       L.H. Zirpolo, in «The Court Historian», 28:3, 2023, pp. 264-68.

• G.B. Fidanza, G. Serafinelli, Patronage and devotion: a focus on six Roman Baroque paintings, London, Paul Holberton Publishing, 2022, pages 128.

• G.B. Fidanza, Luke Wadding’s art: Irish Franciscan patronage in seventeenth-century Rome, St. Bonaventure, NY, Franciscan Institute Publications, 2016, pages viii + 248. 

Good reviews: 

-       D.L. Sparti, in «The Burlington Magazine», no. 1378, vol. CLX, 2018, pp. 66-7; 

-       M. Binasco, in «Studi Irlandesi», no. 8, 2018, pp. 498-99.

-       M. Mac Craith, in «Archivum Franciscanum Historicum», no. 3-4, vol. 110, 2017, pp. 681-86; 

-       L. Gaeta, in «Frate Francesco», no. 2, vol. 83, 2017, pp. 566-70; 

-       M.C. Cola, in «Bollettino d’Arte», no. 30, 2016, pp. 135-38.

Journal articles

• C. Evers, G.B. Fidanza, The Barberini bronze of Septimius Severus: the Pope, his antiquarian, the artists and the engineer, «Journal of Roman Archaeology», Supplement 111, 2023, pp. 176-92.

• N. Macchioni, L. Sozzi, G.B. Fidanza, The Relationship between Carving Work and Timber Features: a Database for the ItalianWooden Statuary, «Forests», no. 1426, vol. 164, 2022, pp. 1-17.

• G.B. Fidanza, Carlo Maratti’s additions to the ‘Barberini Venus’, «The Burlington Magazine», no. 1426, vol. CLXIV, 2022, pp. 260-65.

• G.B. Fidanza, New evidence for the ‘Barberini Apostles’ by Andrea Sacchi and  Carlo Maratti, «The Burlington Magazine», no. 1397, vol. CLXI, 2019, pp. 653-59.

• G.B. Fidanza, The ephemeral apparatus for the funeral of Jan III Sobieski in Rome: Cardinal Carlo Barberini’s art and politics, «Artibus et Historiae», no. 77, 2018, pp. 319-33.

• G.B. Fidanza Carlo Maratti and the Barberini family: two paintings for churches in Palestrina, «The Burlington Magazine», no. 1373, vol. CLIX, 2017, pp. 610-16.

• G.B. Fidanza, Donatellos Maria Magdalena. Technik und Theologie einer Holzfigur, «Wiener Jahrbuch für Kunstgeschichte», 62, 2014, pp. 127-44.

• G.B. Fidanza, A rediscovered altarpiece by Pietro da Cortona and insights into the collaboration between the master and his pupils, «The Burlington Magazine», no. 1325, vol. CLV, 2013, pp. 541-45.

• G.B. Fidanza, Due inedite biografie di Francesco Londonio, «Rivista d’Arte», 2, 2012, pp. 419-38.

• G.B. Fidanza, Überlegungen zu Michelangelo als Holzbildhauer, «Wiener Jahrbuch für Kunstgeschichte», 59, 2010, pp. 49-64.

Book chapters

• G.B. Fidanza, Wood and Architecture. Pliny’s Legacy in the Treatises of Alberti and Cataneo, in The Nature of Art. Pliny the Elder on materials, edited by A. Anguissola and A. Grüner, Turnhout, Brepols, 2020, pp. 91-9.

• G.B. Fidanza, Gli inventari delle chiese prescritti dal Concilio Romano del 1725: una fonte per la storia dell’arte, in Incorrupta monumenta Ecclesiam defendunt. Studi offerti a mons. Sergio Pagano, prefetto dell’Archivio Segreto Vaticano. II Archivi, Archivistica, Diplomatica, Paleografia, edited by A. Gottsmann, P. Piatti and A.E. Rehberg, Vatican City, Archivio Segreto Vaticano, 2018, pp. 401-16 (Series Collectanea Archivi Vaticani).