La Sapienza, il fascismo, una mostra. Snodi critici nella ricezione dell’arte del Ventennio negli anni Ottanta

This article focuses on the exhibition 1935 Gli artisti nell’Università e la questione della pittura murale, curated by Simonetta Lux and Ester Coen, and arranged in the Palazzo del Rettorato of La Sapienza University in Rome in 1985. The reconstruction of the exhibition project and its narrative is framed in the cultural debate on the memory of fascism developed during the 1980s. In this decade, there is indeed a paradigm shift in the public reception of the art of the Ventennio. By exploring a triangulation among research, exhibitions, and restorations, this study traces the transition from the neglect and physical concealment of fascist iconographies to the study and preservation of works of art related to fascist propaganda.