The Research Group
Daniela Padularosa is Researcher in German Literature at the Dipartimento di Studi europei, americani e interculturali, "Sapienza" University of Rome. Starting from a methodological premise that has its roots in Goethe's morphological studies, the proposer aims to investigate Warburg's idea of Pathosformel as a "symptom" of a cultural disease, as it can be found in some literary works of the 19th century (Goethe and Kleist).
Camilla Miglio is Professor in German Literature and Director of the Dipartimento di Studi europei, americani e interculturali, "Sapienza" University of Rome. She will examine Elektra's case study (Hugo von Hofmannsthal), which illustrates the Nachleben of the unheimlich aspect of an "Ancient" declined as feminine, and reactivated by readings such as Nietzsche's Birth of the Tragedy and Breuer's and Freud's Studien über Hysterie.
Gabriele Guerra is Professor in German Literature at the Dipartimento di Studi europei, americani e interculturali, "Sapienza" University of Rome. He will focus on the "uncanny" role of Warburg's Nachleben of images within the history of Western thought, both in the sense of their "phantasmal" re-emergence (Didi-Huberman) and – even more – as iconological traces of that Zwischenraum, repeatedly evoked by Warburg, between energy and danger, word and image, which also found today's visual turn.
Claudia Cieri Via is Professor of Art History at the Dipartimento di Storia Antopologia Religioni Arte Spettacolo, "Sapienza" University of Rome. She will deepen the relationship between image and word from a semantic point of view. The reference to the work of Hermann Osthoff, Vom Suppletivwesen der indogermanischen Sprachen (1899), to which Aby Warburg already refers in his schematic notes of the late 19th and early 20th centuries, finds an original experimentation in the tables of Memory.
Roberto Nicolai is Professor of Greek Language and Literature at the Dipartimento di Scienze dell'Antichità, "Sapienza" University of Rome. He will contribute to the project with investigations on the Atlas Mnemosyne and Warburg's iconological studies. Referring to his research on the theory and practice of the ekphrasis and Orpheus' fortune in Medieval and Renaissance painting, he aims to explore the link between ancient rhetorical theory and historical-artistic research.
Chiara Adorisio is Professore of Ethics at the Dipartimento di Filosofia, "Sapienza" University of Rome. She will analyze the influence of the work of Warburg and the Warburg Bibliotek on the German Jewish intellectuals of the 20th century in the context of a thought that questions the very distinction between East and West and the European Orientalist imaginary. His research intends to dwell on the relationships between Warburg and other German Jewish intellectuals and philosophers, including Cassirer and Klibansky.
Massimo Palma is Professor of Political Philosophy at the Dipartimento Scienze formative, psicologiche e della comunicazione, "Suor Orsola Benincasa" University in Neaples. He will deal with the possible use of Warburg's methodology – the links between Pathosformel and Nachleben of the past – in the context of a politics of memory, in its philosophical and literary effects in the 20th century.
Giulia Fanara is Professor of Theory of Film at the Dipartimento di Storia Antopologia Religioni Arte Spettacolo, "Sapienza" University of Rome. She will analyze Warburg’s writings in relation to 20th century's visual culture -photographie and movie.
Aleksandra Jovicevic is Professor of Performance Studies at the Dipartimento di Storia Antopologia Religioni Arte Spettacolo, "Sapienza" University of Rome. She will investigate the similarities between Warburg's theory and performance studies, a (post) academic discipline founded in the late 70s, which integrates different methodologies (anthropology, aesthetics, art history, performance theory, visual, dance, feminist and queer studies).
Daniela Sacco is Professor of Performance Studies at the IUAV University of Venice. She will investigate the dialectic between 'Kinetik vs Quietil' in Warburg's thought, starting with the Grundlegende Bruchstücke (1888/1896-1905/1912), in order to develop an aesthetic-theatrical reflection on gesture and movement in their relationship with the Körperkultur as the very foundation of the Modern.
Stefania De Lucia teaches German Literature in Rome. She will investigate Aby Warburg’s Nachleben in Hofmannsthal’s Preexistence Theory. In this complex interwoven mixture of present and past with Platonic origins only the poet has the gift of decodification of images through the lens of language and the use of poetical tools such as poetical forms, tropes and rhythm.
