May 30, 2018: Nederlans Koninklijk Instituut Rome, Auditorium, Via Omero 12, Rome
May 31 - June 1, 2018: Academy of Fine Arts in Rome, Aula Magna, Spanish Iron Horse 3, Rome

The 1st Annual International Conference of Studies in art history and design is dedicated to the "Libri e Album di Disegni 1550-1800". The terminological distinction between typological and books of drawings and sketchbooks was introduced by contemporary art history on the basis of documentary and literary evidence, five and seventeenth century. According to sources, artists and connoisseurs they used the term "book of drawings" to indicate that part of the graphic work of painters, engravers, sculptors and architects (and / or their heirs and workshops), bound in volume. Unlike album of drawings, the definition of which remains still open, the book of drawings (drawing-book in English) can be described as "a book of original drawings in a bound volume (book, codex), Consisting of one or more quires (gatherings), which are predominantly filled with drawings, irrespective of the age, intention and profession of a draftsman [...] irrelevant Whether the structure has Been consolidated before or after the drawing process, protected by a leather or binding a simple parchment or paper cover, provided That the drawings were made in quires and not on loose sheets "(Elen, 1995, p. 2).

While the books of drawings intact in their original constitution are quite rare, little known and studied (there is not yet a systematic and rational census), countless are the albums of drawings (monographic or collettanei), formed by connoisseurs, collectors and curators of XVII-XX centuries, in which converged the individual parts or individual sheets from the oldest drawings books. The widespread presence of books of drawings and sketchbooks - joints in more or less fragmentary condition and after many passages owners - in the collections and in public and private libraries around the world, asked to investigate and to analyze fully the historical development of the forms , the functions and content, and to study them under the historical lens of critical fortune and material, the taste and the art market.

Through the original contributions of some of the greatest scholars of the argument, the International Conference aims to highlight the indispensable circularity exists between the study of books of drawings created by artists, and the studio album of drawings made in the size of collecting. This is in order to advance new and unexplored avenues of research, survey and typological classification, and material grammatical, historical and theoretical-critical. To deepen the knowledge of the individual objects (books vs album) and understanding of the theoretical and operational practices (authorial and / or academic and / or atelier) of Italian design and north-European modern era. To expand the genealogy, most often vague and complex, international graphic collections from the historical reconstruction of the dispersion of the rich heritage of bound volumes of drawings, let us - inherited - by the artists of the past.

**For full program, please click on the 'External Link' below.