RESEARCH
Alessandro's research interests over the last years have been varied but all are firmly grounded in a common theme: the way in which spiritual beliefs not only shaped contemporary world views but were also fundamental to cultural expression and political activities.
ORIENTATION
ORIENTATION
ORIENTATION
Alessandro has a strong interest in the ways in which religion and geography intersect and interact, particularly in the context of medieval and early modern sacred geography and ideas about pilgrimage. He has been involved in a research project on pilgrimage practices in different Christian traditions and has focussed on pilgrimage through mental landscapes in the Roman Catholic tradition (at the monastery of Subiaco, Italy, in particular).
He is particularly interested in medieval and Renaissance cartography, including the shift from medieval to Renaissance mapping
He studied the diverse ways in which Christian scholars depicted the Garden of Eden on maps from Late Antiquity to the twenty-first century.
WORD
ORIENTATION
ORIENTATION
Alessandro has a strong interest in Dante. He runs at the Warburg Institute and at the Italian Cultural Institute in London two complementary series of Dante public readings (with John Took), to introduce the general public to the beauty and complexity of Dante’s Divina Commedia and to explore some of the leading ideas of his work.
In the context of his interest in medieval and Renaissance literature on journeys to the otherworld, he devoted particular attention to a little known text by Aeneas Sylvius Piccolomini, the Dialogus de somnio quodam.
IMAGE
ACTION
ACTION
Alessandro has done research on Aby Warburg: on his interest in musical iconography (a topic so far ignored by Warburg scholars), his views on artistic innovation and his involvement in World War I. Alessandro is interested in Warburg’s approach to the birth of opera as part of his study of the afterlife of classical antiquity and the relationships between the North and South of Europe. Dr Scafi has worked on Warburg's views on Dante, Arnold Böcklin and Gabriele D’Annunzio, and his approach to antisemitism and political propaganda.
ACTION
ACTION
ACTION
Alessadro is interested in the history of political and utopian thought. He has researched a number of subjects related to medieval and Renaissance views of the relation between temporal and spiritual powers. He hasworked on the ideal city in the Renaissance as a secular paradise and the birth of the utopian genre in the early modern period. In this context he has devoted particular attention to Filarete’s ideal city of Sforzinda, papal art patronage in Church Jubilee years and the iconography of the heavenly Jerusalem in medieval and Renaissance art.
to contemplate and to hand over on to others the fruits of contemplation
Copyright © 2024 Mapping Paradise - Tutti i diritti riservati.
Gestito da GoDaddy