The Talk

During the 19th Century, travelling rises as a cultural phenomenon among a growing group of people. The number of travellers and publications of journeys reports is increasing and spreads a great interest in explorations: the eighteenth-century Grand Tour expands its social and geographical borders.

The Société de Géographie, established in Paris in 1821, is a symbol of this renewed interest for travels. In one of its bulletins, published in 1824, we can find an exhortation to undertake explorations in Countries still nearly unknown: Arabia, Armenia, North Africa and Persia. The East, in European people mind, mixes reality and fantasy. The most popular routes are Istanbul, Palestine, Egypt, hunting for archaeological antiquities. Few are the ones pushing themselves over eastern Turkey or Persia, mostly English and French. However, the history in explorations reminds us of several Italians too. Italian travel accounts represent a major source for the history of Persia, especially that of the Middle Ages and the Renaissance.

Among those, during the 19th century the artist and patriot Felice De Vecchi (1816-1862) and the naturalist Gaetano Osculati (1808-1894) begin a two-year journey, crossing Ottoman Turkey and Persia heading to India, and going back home throughout the Red Sea and Egypt. Sketches, paintings and the diary written by De Vecchi (Giornale di Carovana) record this journey: a narrative that casts a glance on the rhetoric, the expectations and images built around Persia and the East in general.

The Speaker

Alice Bitto. Master Degree in Philosophy at ‘Università degli Studi di Milano’ and post-graduate studies in Anthropological Studies and Museum Studies at the “Università degli Sudi di Milano Bicocca”. In my Master degree thesis I tried to join my philosophical studies with my great passion for history and Anthropology: rediscovering a completely un-known historical figure, my thesis discusses the deep connection between the life of Felice De Vecchi (Italian patriot, painter, writer and traveller) and the current debate on Orientalism.

I received a second Master Degree in Archival Sciences at the “Università Cà Foscari” of Venice. I am currently a post graduate student at the “Università La Sapienza” of Rome, enrolled in the course of Archival and Bibliographic Sciences (Scuola di Specializzazione in beni archivistici e librari).

How to join

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