(Re)searching connections. Artists’ international social networks (1750-1914).

Musea Brugge is pleased to announce the upcoming conference '(Re)searching connections', which will provide a forum for scholarly exchange about the international social networks of artists active in the period 1750–1914. The conference will be held in Rome, Italy, on 30 September and 1 October 2025. Registration is now open.

The two-day international academic conference presents recent and ongoing research into the social networks of artists who lived, studied, and worked abroad in the period 1750–1914. The conference is organized in collaboration with the Academia Belgica.

Embracing a broad chronological and geographical scope, the conference brings together insights spanning the long nineteenth century and various global contexts. By fostering interdisciplinary dialogue across art history, sociology, and digital humanities, and by connecting diverse methodologies and findings across specializations, we aim to deepen our understanding of the transnational social connections that “make” art history.

Practical info:
Dates: Tuesday 30 September and Wednesday 1 October 2025
Location: Academia Belgica, Via Omero 8, 00196 Rome, Italy
Organizers: Musea Brugge in collaboration with Academia Belgica
Language: English (mainly) and French
Registration: Free, register on this page before 20 September 2025: https://www.museabrugge.be/en/collections/bron/bron_academy/researching_connections
Catering: Coffee, tea and water will be available for all participants. Please note that lunch is provided exclusively for speakers.

Program: Download full Program on our website. https://www.museabrugge.be/en/collections/bron/bron_academy/researching_connections

Tuesday 30 September 2025
10:00-10:05: Welcome address – Anne van Oosterwijk (Musea Brugge)

10:05-10:15: Introduction – Cécile Evers (Academia Belgica)

10:15-11:15: Keynote lecture – France Nerlich (Musée d’Orsay): Between legacy and the living: Artistic dialogues in a transnational Europe

11:15-12:45: Session I: Navigating national identities – chair: Christine Dupont (House of European History)
Thijs Dekeukeleire (Musea Brugge): The writing’s on the wall: Mentorship, mobility and the Bruges-Rome artistic network c. 1800
Cécilia Hurley-Griener (École du Louvre): Réseaux superposés: Espaces et sociabilités dans la Rome du XIXe siècle
Julia A. Sienkewicz (Roanoke College): Networking and the making of a transnational sculptor: The social sites of Luigi Persico

14:15-15:45: Session II: Networks’ sources – chair: Veerle Thielemans (INHA-Institut national d’histoire de l’art)
Virginie D’haene (Museum Plantin-Moretus): Achieving ideals: The social network behind Andries Lens’s neoclassicism
Lucie Montassier (Université de Poitiers): Reconstituer les réseaux des artistes femmes: Les approches cartographiques
Ieva Kalnača & Aija Zandersone (Latvian National Museum of Art): Mapping a network: Documenting Latvian and Spanish artistic connections in Paris (1900–1914)

16:15-17:15: Session III: The studio as a social hub – chair: Laura Overpelt (KNIR-Royal Netherlands Institute in Rome)
Oriane Poret (Université Lyon 2/LARHRA): Beasts on loan: Global networks and the economy of nineteenth-century animal art
Marlen Schneider (Université Grenoble Alpes/LARHRA): In the light of Batoni’s studio: Artistic networks and the circulation of drawing practices between Rome and German art academies

Wednesday 1 October 2025

10:00-10:15: Introduction – Anne van Oosterwijk (Musea Brugge)

10:15-11:15: Keynote lecture – Giovanna Ceserani (Stanford University): “Here in the proper center for gentlemen of [t]his profession”: Artists in eighteenth-century Rome

11:15-12:45: Session IV: From data to networks – chair: Eva Geudeker (RKD-Netherlands Institute for Art History)
Mayken Jonkman (Rijksmuseum Amsterdam): Paris intimates: The role of connections for Dutch artists’ success in the French capital 1774–1914
Fien Messens (Ghent University and KBR-Royal Library of Belgium): Networking over a bowl of onion soup: A data-driven perspective on the artist François-Joseph Navez in Rome
Carla Mazzarelli (Università della Svizzera italiana), Gaetano Cascino (Università della Svizzera italiana and Università Roma Tre) & Luca Piccoli (Università della Svizzera italiana and Sapienza Università di Roma): For a map of artistic sociability inside the Museo di Roma: Nineteenth-century visiting experiences and networks

14:15-15:15: Session V: Academies as anchor – chair: Anne van Oosterwijk (Musea Brugge)
Gabriel Marques (Universidade NOVA de Lisboa – FCSH): National academies and artistic communities in Rome: The Portuguese pensioners of the 1820s–1830s
Dominiek Dendooven (Merghelynck Museum and Yper Museum): A transnational network to ‘revive Flemish art’: Bruges and Rouen in the eighteenth century

15:45-16:45: Session VI: Collaboration across borders – chair: Evelien De Wilde (Musea Brugge)
Nina Reid (Radboud University): The power of the print: International etching societies during the fin-de-siècle
Iliana Mejias-Ojajärvi (University of Helsinki): Russian artists’ exhibition activities in Helsinki, 1890–1911: Organization, artistic exchange, and transnational connections

16:45-17:45: Closing keynote lecture – Giovanna Capitelli (Università Roma Tre): Transnational sources for studying the cosmopolitan art world of early nineteenth-century Rome

18:00-20:00: Reception