Call for Applications:

The Center for the Art and Architectural History of Port Cities “La Capraia” (Centro per la Storia dell’Arte e dell’Architettura delle Città Portuali “La Capraia”) brings artworks and people together to envision new art histories of Naples and southern Italy in their broader cultural worlds.

Founded in 2018 as a partnership between the Museo e Real Bosco di Capodimonte, the Edith O’Donnell Institute of Art History at the University of Texas at Dallas, Franklin University Switzerland, and Amici di Capodimonte ETS, the center is housed in a rustic eighteenth-century agricultural building at the heart of Capodimonte’s historic park and gardens. La Capraia engages the Capodimonte museum, the city of Naples, and southern Italy as laboratories for research in art history and cultural heritage from antiquity to the present. Global in scope, research at La Capraia is grounded in direct study of objects, sites, collections, and archives. Through research residencies for graduate students, on-site programs, and collaborative projects, La Capraia fosters new research on artistic encounter, exchange, and transformation, and cultivates a network of scholars working at the intersection of the global and the local.

The Advisory Committee of the Center for the Art and Architectural History of Port Cities “La Capraia” invites applications for 2027-2028 Predoctoral Research Residencies for PhD students carrying out fieldwork for their dissertations. Projects may focus on art and architectural history, archaeology, histories of collecting, technical art history, cultural heritage, the digital humanities, music history, or related fields, from antiquity to the present. Projects should address the cultural histories of Naples and southern Italy as a center of exchange, encounter, and transformation, and, importantly, make meaningful use of local research materials including artworks, sites, archives, and libraries. We welcome applications for projects that engage with histories of the collections and grounds of Capodimonte, and/or artworks and monuments held there. Projects in the earlier phases of research are preferred.

This coming academic year, Research Residencies will run from 6 September 2027 through 5 June 2028. Research Residents are granted lodging at La Capraia (private bedroom/study/bath and communal study/living/kitchen spaces) and a modest stipend of 7,500 EUR, administered by the Amici di Capodimonte, to help defray the cost of living. During their time in Naples, Research Residents are expected to work on their projects full time and in residence, and to participate in scholarly programs that La Capraia organizes over the course of the year. La Capraia advises Research Residents on access to collections, sites, archives, and libraries as needed for their projects, including at Capodimonte. In the spring semester, Research Residents present their research in an informal gallery talk or site visit; in the summer following the residency period, Research Residents are invited to contribute a short essay to La Capraia’s annual research report.

Residents must arrange their own travel to and from Naples. Residents are responsible for obtaining appropriate visas and a codice fiscale (Italian tax number), for which Capodimonte will provide official letters of support. (Without the codice fiscale, Amici di Capodimonte cannot disburse stipends.) Residents must also provide proof of health insurance during their period in Naples.

We welcome applications from doctoral students of any nationality, preferably in the earlier stages of research for the dissertation. Applicants are invited to submit a letter of interest, a curriculum vitae, and a research proposal of c. 1,500 words. The research proposal should frame the central questions, methods, and scholarly contributions of project, situate the project within existing scholarship, and provide a plan of work for the academic year, indicating the resources that will be used while on site in and around Naples. Materials should be sent in a single PDF file (with last name as the title of the file) to Center Coordinator, Dott.ssa Francesca Santamaria (francesca.santamariautdallas.edu). In addition, applicants must invite three recommenders to send confidential letters of support directly to the same email address. All materials, including letters of recommendation, are due by January 31, 2027. Finalists may be invited to interviews held via Zoom with representatives from the O’Donnell Institute and/or Capodimonte.

Center for the Art and Architectural History of Port Cities “La Capraia”
a collaboration between
Museo e Real Bosco di Capodimonte
The Edith O'Donnell Institute of Art History
Franklin University Switzerland
and Amici di Capodimonte

Director: Sarah K. Kozlowski
Center Coordinator: Francesca Santamaria

Museo e Real Bosco di Capodimonte / La Capraia
Via Lucio Amelio 2 Napoli 80131
Coordinates: 40.87658, 14.25170
Email: lacapraiagmail.com

https://arthistory.utdallas.edu/port-cities/
https://www.instagram.com/lacapraia/