Expodemic is the second edition of the Festival of Foreign Academies and Cultural Institutes in Rome designed to spread out from the Palazzo Esposizioni Roma into the fabric of the city. The exhibition recounts the close bond between the founding and development of exhibitions and the history of the academies, both through the involvement of foreign artists currently resident in the city and through historical documents.

Rome not only hosts the largest number of international cultural centers whose intertwined stories date back to 1666 with the founding of the Académie de France, it is also the city in which the modern concept of the exhibition was first developed. For over forty years, from 1680 to 1720, Giuseppe Ghezzi—a painter, the secretary of the Accademia di San Luca, and the regent of the Congregation of the Virtuous at the Pantheon—organized a series of important exhibitions in the monumental complex of San Salvatore in Lauro, showcasing artworks from the collections of Rome’s aristocratic families and thus forging the concept of the modern exhibition. Thanks to his ability to understand his own period in history, Ghezzi made art public through his series of exhibitions, developing a modern and democratic notion of culture, and, in effect, playing the role of history’s first modern curator.

Expodemic sets out from the Palazzo Esposizioni exhibition to spread throughout the city with a series of posters specially produced for the occasion and distributed free of charge in its cultural partners’ various venues. The exhibition aims to illustrate the importance of the deep-rooted bond between the Palazzo delle Esposizioni and Rome’s foreign academies and cultural institutions, highlighting that cultural archipelago’s richness and diversity as well as its ongoing role, so crucial and relevant to our own time. The exhibition also includes a public program of encounters, performances, and screenings hosted at Palazzo Esposizioni in addition to numerous exhibitions and events organized in the academies and cultural institutes themselves.

This year, the American Academy in Rome has added to the exhibition by providing selected materials from its photographic archive, such as photographs, posters, and memorabilia.

Additionally, the exhibition will showcase the works of four of the 2024 Fellows in the arts: Kamrooz Aram, Zachary Fabri, Estefanía Puerta Grisales, and Fatma Bucak.

Expodemic, curated by Lorenzo Benedetti in collaboration with Francesca Campana, is on view from May 7 to August 25, 2024.