In 2018 British art historian Robert Gibbs, Emeritus Professor and Honorary Senior Research Fellow in History of Art at Glasgow University, donated his copious photo archive to the Federico Zeri Foundation. The gesture marks his long acquaintance with Bologna and its cultural institutions, as well as his esteem for the Foundation.
Initiated around 1968, the collection reflects Gibbs’s research interests, focusing on 14th-century Bolognese and Emilian painting and miniature.
It is well-nigh exhaustive on the output of artists like Lippo di Dalmasio and Tommaso da Modena, relations between miniature and Bolognese legal codexes, and that of other major European centres, especially French and Nordic; likewise the dissemination of Vitale da Bologna and followers’ art in Friuli, Slovenia, Austria and Slovakia.
With its variety of photographic material, largely the work of the scholar himself and complete with hand-written notes, the Gibbs archive is a precious addition to the Zeri Archive’s sections 14th-century Painting and Miniature.
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