Brepols Museology and Values: Art and Human Dignity in the 21st Century (Museums and Ideas)

Do 21st-century women and men still believe that museums can, through the way they display art, help shape their visitors' sense of the dignity of the person? Through the readings of history and style which they propose, can museums help bridge the gap that today seems to separate present from past, isolating individuals and groups in a contemporaneity without roots? If so, how? If not, why? About the Author Timothy Verdon is director of the Museo dell'Opera del Duomo, Florence. Monsignor Timothy Verdon, a Canon of the city's cathedral, Santa Maria del Fiore, is also Director of the Office of Sacred Art of the Florentine Archdiocese and former Consultor of the Vatican Commission of Church Heritage. Author of numerous books and articles on Christian art, Verdon, who has a Ph.D. in art history from Yale University and has been a Fellow of the Harvard University Center for Italian Renaissance Studies, Villa I Tatti (Florence), is Robert and Katherine Burke Instructor in Art History at Stanford University's Bing Center in Florence, Italy. Verdon, who has organized major exhibitions at Turin, Washington, D. C., Seoul and New York City, furnished the installation project of the Museo dell'Opera del Duomo, enlarged and entirely renovated in 212–215. Rita Filardi is an experienced museum professional and art historian, she has been working in museums and the temporary exhibitions field since 1995. Since her arrival in 212 at the Museum of the Opera del Duomo, she has been Collection Registrar, Assistant to the Director and currently she is Collection Manager, overseeing the condition and the records of 75 artworks of the museum.