Dr Eduardo De Maio

Eduardo De Maio is an art historian and curator specializing in the art and cultural dynamics in the long nineteenth century, with a particular focus on the cultural connections between Italy and Britain at the fin de siècle. His research explores cross-cultural exchange, the history and dynamics of the art trade, collecting practices, art marketing, and the mechanisms shaping artistic taste. He is also interested in the intersections between culture and politics, ideology and stereotyping, the political and ideological agency of images and visual culture, and the role of periodicals in the circulation of artistic ideas. His broader research interests include Futurism, Victorian art, and European Avant-Gardes in their global context, printed culture, exhibition culture, socialism and the arts, and transnational artistic networks in the nineteenth and early twentieth centuries.

He received his PhD in History of Art from the University of York in 2025. His doctoral thesis examined the cultural exchange between Britain and Italy from 1870 to 1914, highlighting how social, political, and ideological forces shaped and mediated the artistic relationship between the two countries. In 2022, he was a Research Fellow at the Center for Italian Modern Art (CIMA) in New York, where he investigated the Anglo-American literary foundations of socially engaged art in late nineteenth-century Italy. He also worked as a Teaching Assistant in the Department of History of Art at the University of York.

Alongside his academic work, Eduardo has worked in the international Old Masters art market, and has collaborated with a number of leading institutions in Britain, including the Paul Mellon Centre and Tate, where he co-organized the conference (June 2023), dedicated to the legacy of the Rossetti family (Dante Gabriel, Christina, William Michael, and Elizabeth Siddall). He has also contributed to curatorial projects in Italy, including the blockbuster exhibition (Forlì, 2024), curated by Elizabeth Prettejohn, Peter Trippi, Cristina Acidini, and Francesco Parisi, exploring the relationship between Pre-Raphaelitism and Italian Old Masters; and in the United States, where he co-curated with Laura Mattioli Rossi (Italian Cultural Institute, Miami, 2024), an exhibition exploring the Futurist artist’s pioneering contribution to advertising, visual communication, and commercial design.

Eduardo’s recent publications include the article , dedicated to the interference of stereotypes and socio-political dynamics in the showcasing of Italian art in Britain in the late nineteenth century. He also has two forthcoming articles, respectively examining the friendship between the writer Vernon Lee and the Italian painter Telemaco Signorini, to appear in Cahiers victoriens et édouardiens (2026), and another exploring the dichotomies in the reception of ancient and modern Italian art in the exhibition rooms of the Royal Academy of Arts, forthcoming in Predella (2026).

Teaching

MA in Art and Business:

Autumn and Spring Terms 2026-2027: Histories of the Art Market
Autumn and Spring Terms 2026-2027: MAAB Elective: Marketing and Circulating the Modern: Taste in Transition c. 1800-1920
Spring Term 2026-2027: Understanding the Art Market

Education

BA in Cultural Studies (Laurea Triennale in Storia e Tutela dei Beni Archeologici, Artistici, Archivistici e Librari) – Università degli Studi di Firenze (2014-2017)
MA in History of Art (Modern and Contemporary) – University of York (2018-2019)
PhD in History of Art – University of York (2019-2025)

Research Interests

Art and cultural dynamics in the long 19th century,
Italy and Britain cultural relationships (1800-1920s)
Cross-cultural exchange and transnational artistic networks
History and dynamics of the art trade, collecting practices, and art marketing
History of artistic taste
Art and cultural networks in the nineteenth and early twentieth centuries
Intersections between culture and politics, ideology and stereotyping
Political and ideological agency of images and visual culture
Socialism and the arts
Role of periodicals in the circulation of artistic ideas, and printed culture
Exhibition culture and agency (1850s-1920s)
Italian art (1800-1920s)
British art (1800-1920s)
French art (1850s-1914)
Futurism and European Avant-Gardes in their global context

Publications

Peer-Reviewed Journal Articles

(Forthcoming) Eduardo De Maio, “L’arte italiana tra promozione e conservatorismo nelle aule e nelle sale della Royal Academy di Londra”, Predella 59 (Autumn 2026).
(Forthcoming) Eduardo De Maio, “Violet Paget and Telemaco Signorini: mutual esteem and promotion in Florence at the fin de siècle,” Cahiers victoriens et édouardiens 104 (Autumn 2026), Special issue Vernon Lee and the European cultural heritage��: Reciprocal influences and intermedial dialogue,eds. Christophe Gelly et Emilie Laurent, Université de Clermont-Ferrand.
Eduardo De Maio, “Showcasing ‘Modern Italian art’ in Britain: The Fine Art Pavilion of the Italian Exhibition in London of 1888,” Colnaghi Studies Journal 17 (October 2025): 144-163.

Edited and curated volumes

(Curated volume) Tornabuoni Arte Antica, Dipinti e Arredi Antichi 20 (2026). Ed. Roberto Casamonti, Eduardo De Maio, Maria Diletta Pianorsi, et al. Florence: Tornabuoni Art, 2026.
(Curated volume) Tornabuoni Arte Antica, Dipinti e Arredi Antichi 19 (2025). Ed. Roberto Casamonti, Eduardo De Maio, Maria Diletta Pianorsi, et al. Florence: Tornabuoni Art, 2025

Chapters and Contributions in Edited Volumes

(Forthcoming) (Chapter) Eduardo De Maio, “La Revue La Triennale: le symbolisme international et le débat sur la valeur sociale de la beauté en Italie,” in Le Symbolisme Monde, ed. Patrick McGuinness, Stefano Evangelista, and Clement Dessy (Brussels: Éditions de l’Université de Bruxelles).
(Exhibition Catalogue Chapter/contribution) Eduardo De Maio, “Schede” (catalogue entries, signed with EDM), in Preraffaelliti. Rinascimento Moderno. Ed. by Cristina Acidini, Gianfranco Brunelli, Francesco Parisi, Elizabeth Prettejohn, and Peter Trippi (Milan: Dario Cimorelli Editore, 2024), 513-17; 534-36; 541; 549-54; 562-67.
(Chapter) Eduardo De Maio, “Il sacrificio dell’antropocentrismo. Verso l’attivismo ecocentrico (The Sacrifice of Anthropocentrism. Towards the Ecocentric Activism)”, in We Are the Flood. A Science Museum Project to Address the Environmental Crisis through Contemporary Art, ed. by Stefano Cagol (Milan: Postmedia Books, 2023), 98-99.

Organised conferences

June 15-16, 2023. “Rossettis: In Relation”, Tate, London. Co-organized with Sarah Victoria Turner (Director, Paul Mellon Centre, London), Carol Jacobi (Curator of British Art 1850-1915, Tate Britain), and Nicholas Dunn-McAfee (University of York). A collaboration between Paul Mellon Centre, Tate, and the History of Art Department of the University of York.
April 29-30, 2022. Staging Injustice: Italian Art, 1870-1917 – CIMA Study Days, Center for Italian Modern Art (CIMA), New York City. Co-organized with Nicola Lucchi (Director of CIMA), Dr. Vivien Greene (Senior Curator, Guggenheim Museum, New York) and CIMA Winter-Spring 2022 Research Fellows Camilla Froio (University of Florence) and Giorgio Motisi (Scuola Normale Superiore, Pisa).

Papers, Talks & Chairing (Selected)

June 4, 2026. (Paper) “Promoting “Modern Italian Art” in Britain: Vittore Grubicy de Dragon, “The Illustrated Catalogue of Alberto Grubicy’s picture gallery” and the Italian Exhibition in London (1888)”. Part of the conference ‘Catalogues d’exposition et galeries d’art’, 4-5 June 2026, MSH, Lyon. Organized by Alice Ensabella (UGA / LARHRA), Mica Gherghescu (Bibliothèque Kandinsky, Centre Pompidou), Marie Gispert (UGA / LARHRA) et Hélène Trespeuch (Université Bordeaux Montaigne / Centre François-Georges Pariset).
March 11, 2026. (Chair) (Invited) Seminar “France and Italy: Receptions and Entanglements.” Organized by the Pre-Raphaelite Society Graduate Network (Pre-Raphaelite Society). Online.
November 12, 2025. (Paper) (Invited) “L’arte italiana tra promozione e conservatorismo nelle aule della Royal Academy di Londra”. Part of the conference ‘Storia dell’arte e Accademie di Belle Arti: origini, sviluppi, prospettive’, 12-13 November 2025, Accademia di Belle Arti di Firenze, Florence. Organized by Gerardo de Simone e Cristina Frulli.
September 18, 2025. (Paper) “Violet Paget and Telemaco Signorini: mutual friendship and promotion in Florence at the fin de siècle”. Part of the conference ‘Vernon Lee and the European cultural heritage: Reciprocal influences and intermedial dialogue,’ 18-19 September 2025 Bâtiment Olympe de Gouges, Paris LARCA (Université Paris Cité), CELIS – Université Clermont Auvergne; in collaboration with the International Vernon Lee Society. Org. by Christophe Gelly and Emilie Laurent.
April 11, 2025. (Paper) “Nino Costa and the “Roma Preraffaellita”: Forging cultural internationalism in Rome at the fin de siècle.” Included in the panel “Pre-Raphaelite Networks”, organized by Serena Trowbridge and Emily Learmont, AAH Conference 2025, University of York, 9-11 April 2025, York, U.K.).
June 18, 2024. (Paper) ‘“L’alfabeto è luce”: La missione sociale delle Scuole per i contadini nell’Agro Romano (1904–1914)’ (“The Alphabet is the light:” The social mission of the Schools for peasants in the Roman Agro, 1904-1914). Part of the conference ‘XXII École de Printemps du Réseau International pour la Formation à la Recherche en Histoire de l’Art, Social Imagining and the Role of Images, Artworks and Buildings’, Weimar, 17-21 June 2024. Organized by Prof. Johannes Grave, Britta Hochkirchen and Justus Hierlmeier (Friedrich-Schiller Universität Jena)
May 18, 2024. (Paper) “The magazine La Triennale: International symbolism and the debate on the social value of beauty in Italy”. Part of the conference “Worlding Symbolism: Les Mondes du Symbolisme”, Université Libre de Bruxelles, May 16-18, 2024. Organized by Dr. Clément Dessy (Université Libre Bruxelles, Brussels), Prof. Stefano Evangelista (Trinity College, Oxford), and Prof. Patrick McGuinness (St. Anne’s, Oxford)
April 10, 2024. (Chair) (Invited) (Seminar) “British Pre-Raphaelites in Italy: Making an Exhibition in 2024.” Delivered by Professor Liz Prettejohn, Head of Department, History of Art, University of York.
June 16, 2023. (Chair) (Invited) Panel “International Exchanges”, part of the conference “Rossettis: In Relation”, Tate, London (June 15-16, 2023). Co-organized with Sarah Victoria Turner (Director, Paul Mellon Centre, London), Carol Jacobi (Curator of British Art 1850-1915, Tate Britain), and Nicholas Dunn-McAfee (University of York). A collaboration between Paul Mellon Centre, Tate, and the History of Art Department of the University of York.
January 14, 2023. (Paper) “Stereotypes on view: Exhibiting Italy in Britain at the turn of the twentieth century”. Part of the symposium National Identity and Exhibition Histories: from fin-de-siècle world’s fairs to contemporary art biennials (AHRC M4C funded). Online. Organized by Claudia di Tosto (University of Warwick, Paul Mellon Centre) and Maria Chiara Scudieri (University of Leicester).
April 29, 2022. (Paper) “«How do you feel about socialism: sympathetic, adverse or indifferent?» International Sources and Socially Engaged Italian Art, 1882-1914” (Part of the CIMA Study Days, April 29-30, 2022). Center for Italian Modern Art, New York. Co-organized with Nicola Lucchi (Director of CIMA), Dr. Vivien Greene (Senior Curator, Guggenheim Museum, New York) and CIMA Winter-Spring 2022 Research Fellows Camilla Froio (University of Florence) and Giorgio Motisi (Scuola Normale Superiore, Pisa).

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