An extraordinary journey through the eyes of former observers, intellectuals and artists from all over the world, when they first met with the wonders of the findings of Herculaneum (1738) and Pompeii (1748).
The exhibition "Herculaneum and Pompeii. Visions of a discovery is a journey into the effects and observations that the Vesuvian cities, buried by the eruption of 79 AD and unveiled by the excavations of the eighteenth century, have exerted on scientists, archaeologists, scholars and exceptional interpreters, who lived between the eighteenth and early twentieth century.
The exhibition itinerary, born from the synergy of the National Archaeological Museum of Naples with the Cultural Centre M.A.X in Chiasso, is therefore a narrative back in time whose steps, as well as being marked by twenty-five precious archaeological finds, are enriched and accompanied by letters, watercolors, notebooks, engravings, lithographs, drawings, reliefs, matrices, gouaches, photographs and postcards.
This exciting research, carried out thanks to the collaboration with about twenty institutions and individuals who have lent the works present in their collections in Italy, Switzerland, France and the United States.
The common thread is the amazement that has pervaded the soul of men distinguished in capturing the beauty of the archaeological remains of Herculaneum and Pompeii. These range from Karl Jakob Weber to Piranesi, from François Mazois to William Gell, from Luigi Rossini to Pietro Bianchi, from Giacomo Brogi to the Alinari brothers. These authoritative profiles are spokespeople for the need to protect and enhance the cities unearthed.