Project Team

Principal Investigator

Professor Fabrizio Nevola

Fabrizio Nevola is Professor of Art History and Visual Culture at the University of Exeter and Principal Investigator of Florence4D. He specialises on the urban and architectural history of Early Modern cities, with a particular focus on public space and the Italian peninsula. Recent work has involved significant elements of digital humanities approaches, also applied to public engagement, including the ongoing Hidden Cities project. He is the author of Siena: Constructing the Renaissance City (Yale University Press, 2007) and Street Life in Renaissance Italy (Yale University Press, 2020). Read more...

Co-Investigator

Dr Donal Cooper

Donal Cooper  is Senior Lecturer in Italian Art at the University of Cambridge and Co-Investigator of Florence4D. His research focuses on Italian ecclesiastical art and architecture, particularly with regard to the spatial configuration and material reconstruction of church interiors, extending to paintings, sculpture, liturgical furniture and other elements of fabric. His co-authored volume with Janet Robson, The Making of Assisi (Yale University Press) won the 2014 Art Book prize. His interest in recovering historic church interiors through digital visualization goes back to 2007. Read more...

Researchers

Luca Brunke

Luca Brunke is an AHRC-funded PhD student on the Collaborative Doctoral Project “Research-based 3D modelling of Renaissance built environments”, jointly supervised by the University of Exeter and the National Gallery, London. He did a MSc in Digital Archaeology at the University of Leiden and a BA at the University of Tübingen. As a researcher on the Florence 4D project, he has carried out 3D scanning and 3D modelling of renaissance built environments in Florence. Furthermore, he has helped develop a pipeline for research-based 3D modelling and provided animation for museum exhibits.

Chiara Capulli

Chiara Capulli is an AHRC-funded PhD candidate in History of Art at the University of Cambridge and a pre-doctoral fellow at the Bibliotheca Hertziana (Max Planck Institute for Art History, Rome) with a research project that examines the consequences brought by the 1529 Guasto of Florence to the city’s artistic and architectural heritage. In her PhD, she tackles the themes of displacement, artistic identity and networks of artistic patronage by integrating traditional art historical research with spatial methodologies. As a researcher on the Florence 4D project (2019-21), she has carried out art historical research, trained interns, and has helped develop a pipeline for research-based 3D modelling, metadata-mapping and sharing using the CIDOC CRM ontology and IIIF manifests. As a Methods Fellow at CDH for the academic year 2020-21, she provided training in digital tools to Cultural Heritage professionals. Read more...

Research Associates

Giovanni Pescarmona

Giovanni Pescarmona is a digital art historian and PhD candidate at the University of Florence, his research interests focus on innovative digital technologies for the enhancement of Cultural Heritage. He works as an advisor for Italian and foreign museums (Fiesole, Florence, Cambridge) for the creation of digital products and experiences. Giovanni helped to create the ‘Bandini Icon’ AR app for the Musei di Fiesole that integrates panel paintings in the Museo Bandini with related works elsewhere and conservation data. For the Florence 4D project, he contributed to data capture, site fieldwork and archival research. Read more...

Project Interns

Francesca Aimi

Francesca Aimi is a PhD candidate at the University of Cambridge. Her research explores the role of Domenico Veneziano in mid-15th-century Florence by studying his key works within their contexts. This brought her closer to the project as she aims to digitally reconstruct the sites of Veneziano's works that have been destroyed or altered over time. Read more...

Katherine Dau

Katherine Dau completed her MPhil in the History of Art at the University of Cambridge in 2021. Her research focuses on Apostolic Visitations in sixteenth-century Italy. She has contributed her geolocation of altars in Alfonso Binarini’s Apostolic Visitation to Florence in 1575 to the Florence 4D project.

Alessandra Horton

Alessandra Horton is a history graduate from the University of Exeter. Her contributions to the Florence 4D project include manuscript transcription, geodata mapping and image research.

Natalie Francis Massong

Natalie Francis Massong is a PhD candidate in the Analysis and Management of Cultural Heritage at IMT School for Advanced Studies Lucca, Italy. Her involvement in the project includes converting historical data and establishing the geo-coordinates for locations found in the 1525 Description of Florence into a readable format for the database.

Anna McGee

Anna McGee is an AHRC-funded PhD student, working on a Collaborative Doctoral Project jointly supervised by the University of Exeter and the National Gallery, London. Her research will inform the geo-mapping of 15th-century palazzi interiors across Florence and the digital modelling of lost spaces within the Palazzo Medici.

Sarah Spencer

Sarah Spencer is a third year PhD student affiliated with the project Hidden Cities, who researches the impact of Venice on the central piazze of its subject cities on the terraferma and the stato da mar, 1400-1550. Her contributions to Florence 4D included Italian data transcription and georeferencing, as well as creating content for social media.

Estrella Torrico Cuadrado

Estrella Torrico Cuadraro is a PhD student in Art History and Visual Culture at the University of Exeter with a thesis focusing on the Italian talking statues' phenomenon from the Renaissance to the present day. She has contributed to the Florence 4D project with transcription, social media, and geodata mapping.

Michela Young

Michela Young's doctoral research focuses on the Florentine, urban churches of the Vallombrosan order, Santa Trinita and the lost church of San Pancrazio. She is investigating the social matrix of the Florentine Vallombrosan neighbourhood through the GIS mapping of historical documents. She also hopes to be able to contribute to the Florence 4D project through the creation of 3D reconstructions of these churches. Read more...