What is it about?
This paper discusses the display and exhibition strategies for the Italian decorative arts at the 1900 Paris Universal Exhibition, a key event for promoting the country's achievements involving a widespread network of players. Based on archival documents, it reveals the efforts of Florentine art dealer Stefano Bardini to operate across distances and his staff's negotiations to obtain a convenient venue and display for Bardini's temporary museum in Paris.
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Why is it important?
This paper sheds light on a promotional event staged by a private dealer with small press coverage in contemporary chronicles, which would be otherwise unknown if not for archival documents. Furthermore, it brings into focus the art market’s professional networks and dynamics and the many different hidden dealers’ strategies for securing wealthy purchasers.
Perspectives
This essay addresses all interested in decorative arts and exhibitions, hoping to stimulate new research. Writing it has been an exciting experience. I hope the effort to reconstruct an almost hidden history will be appreciated.
professor Paola Cordera
Politecnico di Milano
Read the Original
This page is a summary of: Staging Italian Artworks at the 1900 Paris Universal Exposition for the Benefit of a Transnational Art Market, August 2023, De Gruyter,
DOI: 10.1163/9789004680449_008.
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