I Tatti is pleased to announce that the papers of Ezio Bassani (1924–2018), who was the foremost historian and critic of African art in Italy, are now available for consultation. His fully catalogued personal library is likewise open to the public. Together, the archive and book collection, acquired in 2022 as part of I Tatti's Mediterraneo Nero project, constitute an invaluable resource for the study of African art and its reception in Italy.
In the 1970s, under the influence of Carlo Ludovico Ragghianti, Bassani extensively surveyed works of African production in Italian museums and collections. Together with Ragghianti, he established a Center for the Study of African Art in Florence at the International University of Art (UIA), which published journal issues.
In Florence, Bassani curated two major exhibitions of African art: Tesori dell’antica Nigeria (1984, Palazzo Strozzi) and La grande scultura dell’Africa Nera (1989, Forte Belvedere). These exhibitions were among many he organized, alone or with international experts, in Italy, France, England, Germany, and the United States. His expertise in African art earned him enduring collaborations with prominent scholars, curators, collectors, and dealers.
The collection comprises around 120 archival boxes, including over 6,000 mainly black-and-white photographs and hundreds of negatives and transparencies. It also contains correspondence, research notes, clippings, reproductions, typescripts, offprints, and other documents; while the book collection holds around 2,500 volumes.