In Greek Mythology, the Muses were inspirational goddesses who presided over the Arts and encouraged creation, enhancing imagination and vision of the artists. They were nine sisters, born from the union of the God of Gods, Zeus, and a young titan lady named Menmosyne. Mnemosyne was the goddess of Memory.

It is so inspiring today to understand and remember that, since the beginning of Man's history, Memory has been considered the essential motive of human expression and the basis of all life and creativity. More widely, we can state that there would be no human heritage without Memory, and Man’s desire to preserve Memory over time. I might have some sort of issue with Memory, as Memory, History and Heritage have always captured my attention, since I first met iconologist Aby Warburg in my academic studies and started exploring his masterpiece, named Mnemosyne, the "Atlas of Memory”.

     In the 1920s, the German historian of art and culture Aby Warburg created his visual Atlas Mnemosyne by rearranging canonized images and looking at them across epochs, tracing recurring visual themes, images and patterns across time, from antiquity to the Renaissance and beyond to contemporary culture.

 

His project traversed the boundaries between art history, philosophy and anthropology and provided inspiration for today’s visually and digitally dominated world. In the same way, he deeply influenced my own way into the art world: today I am an historian of art and museologist myself, with a strong background in literature, and contemporary history, a consistent management experience in museums and galleries, and a professional life as a painter and interior decorator following a Bachelor's degree at the Fine Art Academy.