“Divenendo ben presto un’espressione fervida e intensa”. Pietro Zampetti e l’istituzione della storia dell’arte a Ca’ Foscari

This contribution presents preliminary research findings on the establishment of art history teaching at Ca' Foscari, initiated by Pietro Zampetti as a freelance lecturer during his years in Venice as civic director of Fine Arts. The first art history course was taught, apud doctrinam, by the Faculty of Foreign Languages and Literature, an institution that existed at the time alongside the Faculty of Economics and Commerce, renamed in 1936. At the behest of the then rector Italo Siciliano, starting in the 1957/1958 academic year, Pietro Zampetti took over the course as lecturer, directing the teaching towards a solid alternation between the features of Italian and European art history from late antiquity to the 19th century and monographic courses focused on figurative culture, to which he dedicated several research courses, from International Gothic to Aspects of Rococo in Europe and German Expressionism. He adopted a solid, pragmatic methodology – characteristic of his personality as well as his discipline – consistent with the city's cultural programme, so that during the years of the Biennials of Ancient Art, the monographic courses mirrored the exhibitions, allowing for educational visits outside of class hours, seminar lessons in the exhibition and teaching focused on direct contact with the works.