Projects
Dietro le quinte
The Giovanni Poleni Museum is actively involved in numerous projects to research and enhance scientific heritage, with international collaborations, exhibitions, loans, and restorations that contribute to promoting the history of physics and its applications.
Scattered Collections Project (2015–2016)
In addition to the museums and collections officially recognized by the University, the University of Padua preserves a vast amount of scattered material, which represents a historical heritage of great value, the result of research and teaching conducted over the centuries. The “Scattered Collections” project, funded by the University, aimed to identify and enhance this “submerged” heritage. Two annual research grants allowed for the identification of various collections of great historical, cultural, and scientific importance, and the drafting of a report that presents the current situation of the collections and proposes guidelines for their management, restoration, and enhancement.
Project Manager: Giulio Peruzzi
Coordinator: Sofia Talas
Research Fellows: Giulia Nicchio, Fanny Marcon
Recent or ongoing loans
Imago oculi. Canaletto e la visione di Prato della Valle
(October 15, 2016–February 27, 2017)
A camera obscura from the Museum of History of Physics was loaned to the exhibition organized by the Municipality of Padua at Palazzo Angeli. This camera obscura, dating back to the first half of the 18th century, was purchased by the Venetian Republic for experimental philosophy lessons at the University of Padua.
The eye in play
(September 24, 2022–February 26, 2023)
The Giovanni Poleni Museum participated in the exhibition with the loan of five instruments from the 18th and 19th centuries, including anamorphosis tables and an apparatus for optical experiments. These instruments illustrate the spectacular physics lessons of the eighteenth century and nineteenth-century studies on color perception, which contributed to the birth of experimental psychology.
Recent or ongoing restoration
Electromagnetic instruments designed and built in the early 19th century by Salvatore Dal Negro, professor of experimental physics at Padua, have recently been cleaned. These devices, fundamental to the history of electricity, have been reconstructed, and some missing parts have been reconstructed in Plexiglas to highlight the original operation of the instruments.