The fascination of autographs

La Venerable Ambrosian Library opens its precious collections to an extraordinary journey through almost eight hundred years of history, inviting the public to a close encounter with some of the most emblematic personalities of European culture. The fascination of autographs, edited by Msgr. Francesco Braschi, proposes an intense and surprising experience: approaching the great protagonists of the past through their handwriting, intimate mirror of their humanity.

Behind names like St Thomas Aquinas, Lucrezia Borgia, Pietro Bembo, Ludovico Ariosto, Michelangelo, Galileo Galilei, Ugo Foscolo, Napoleon Bonaparte, Alessandro Manzoni, Gabriele d'Annunzio e Giuseppe Verdi conceal lives, passions, political tensions and creative impulses that marked entire epochs. The exhibition brings these protagonists surprisingly close thanks to original documents, letters, decrees, minutes and literary pages that restore the concrete vibration of the graphic gesture: strokes that are decisive or uncertain, solemn or passionate, capable of telling much more than words alone.

Prominent among the “pieces of history” on display is the letter with which Galileo Galilei donates to Frederick Borromeo a copy of the Assayer, a missive between Lucrezia Borgia e Pietro Bembo, an autograph of the’Orlando furious by Ludovico Ariosto, a decree of grace signed by Napoleon Bonaparte and a note from Giuseppe Verdi. Also particularly significant are documents related to the history of the Ambrosiana itself, including letters from St Charles Borromeo and the Constitutions confirmed by Frederick Borromeo with its signature.

In an age dominated by the virtual, the exhibition celebrates the power of the “realia”, material testimonies that guard the memory of humanity, transforming the visit into a personal and involving experience within one of the most important cultural treasure troves of Milan.