Methodologies of Exchange: MoMA's "Twentieth-Century Italian Art" (1949)

The third issue of \u201cItalian Modern Art\u201d journal by CIMA (Center for Italian Modern Art) is dedicated to MoMA 1949 exhibition Twentieth-Century Italian Art. The publication is based on the conference, \u201cMethodologies of Exchange: The Exhibition Twentieth-Century Italian Art (MoMA, 1949)\u201d organized by Raffaele Bedarida, Silvia Bignami and Davide Colombo at CIMA in New York in February 2019, in connection with the Annual Conference of the College Art Association and the 70th anniversary of the original exhibition. The conference was made possible by a Terra Foundation for American Art grant. The exhibition Twentieth-Century Italian Art at the Museum of Modern Art in New York, which constructed dominant interpretive keys that today continue to affect the study and perception of Italian modernism. In effect Twentieth-Century Italian Art was the first opportunity after World War II for American audiences to see the work of a substantial group of contemporary Italian artists. Curated by James Thrall Soby and Alfred H. Barr, Jr., the exhibition was followed by a vast campaign of acquisitions: MoMA added key Italian artists, from Umberto Boccioni to Lucio Fontana, to its permanent collection and thereby situated them within the museum\u2019s influential narrative of modernism. Further, the Italian show aided MoMA curators in revising their institutional perspective in the Cold War context, moving it beyond a Paris-centered canon. By studying this exhibition from multiple angles, this issue intends to explore and combine various methodological approaches. The initiative involved a group of international scholars who have focused on topics connected with Twentieth-Century Italian Art and the Italy-U.S. relationship from different fields of study, including exhibition histories, cultural transfer, cultural diplomacy, art and politics, the history of collecting, the history of the art market, and more

Acute lower limb ischemia due to thrombo-embolic arterial occlusions in two previously healthy men with markedly elevated Lp(a)

Lipoprotein (a) (Lp(a)) is a well-documented risk factor for atherosclerotic cardiovascular disease. Its role in acute thrombo-embolic occlusions of peripheral arteries is not known. We describe two cases of multiple, acute, peripheral arterial occlusions in two previously healthy men with markedly elevated Lp(a). Both cases had unsatisfactory results after percutaneous and surgical revascularization procedures. Experience yielded in these two cases suggests that when an unfavorable outcome occurs in a peripheral artery disease patient in the absence of the regular risk factors, Lp(a) should be determined and its role investigated

Export / Import: The Promotion of Contemporary Italian Art in the United States, 1935–1969

Export / Import examines the exportation of contemporary Italian art to the United States from 1935 to 1969 and how it refashioned Italian national identity in the process. I do not concentrate on the Italian art scene per se, or on the American reception of Italian shows. Through a transnational perspective, instead, I examine the role of art exhibitions, publications, and critical discourse aimed at American audiences. Inaugurated by the Fascist regime as a form of political propaganda, this form of cultural outreach to the United States continued after WWII as Italian museums, dealers, and critics aimed to vaunt the new republic’s political validity and cultural vitality in a process of national rehabilitation and economic modernization. My thesis is that, beyond the immediate aim of political propaganda and of creating a new foreign market for Italian art, these cultural manifestations had a more important function for their makers: they served as laboratories for Italians to construct their own modern identity. The United States, in fact, represented not only the world’s new dominant cultural and economic power, but also the paradigm of modernity. Bringing contemporary Italian art to the US in key moments when the relationship between the two countries was redefined, was a way to re-invent Italy’s self-image at home. Export / Import argues three major points that complicate standard narratives of Italian Fascist propaganda on the one hand and of American Cold War imperialism on the other. First, I challenge the idea of propaganda as a one-way action that affects only the receiving end by showing the transformative power that the making of propaganda has on the identity of its makers. Secondly, I question the idea of influence, ubiquitous in art historical discourse. What has been deterministically simplified as the phenomenon of Americanization of Italian culture and identity is studied here as a pro-active and non-linear process of identity construction on the part of the supposedly passive object of cultural imperialism. Finally, I address traveling exhibitions as a form of translation: both physical and cultural. Exported to a different country, artworks changed context and took on new meaning. Some of them entered American collections, others returned to Italy with new connotations attached to them. After an introduction, which examines futurist artist Fortunato Depero’s experience in New York (1929-1931) and his subsequent fixation with America, the discussion begins with the exhibitions of contemporary art organized by the Fascist Regime in the US (1935-1940). The second chapter investigates Twentieth-Century Italian Art held at MoMA in 1949 and other postwar shows that promoted a “New Italian Renaissance,” allegedly the fruit of both the Allied liberation of Italy and the defeat of Communism in the Italian political elections of 1948. Chapter three focuses on a third wave of shows that, during the “economic boom” of the late fifties, advertised a “New Italy,” optimistic and open to American culture. The final chapter analyzes the launch of Arte Povera on American soil as both a specifically Italian reaction against “Cocacolonization” and part of the international protests of the late sixties

DNA methylation analysis of the angiotensin converting enzyme (ACE) gene in major depression.

The angiotensin converting enzyme (ACE) has been repeatedly discussed as susceptibility factor for major depression (MD) and the bi-directional relation between MD and cardiovascular disorders (CVD). In this context, functional polymorphisms of the ACE gene have been linked to depression, to antidepressant treatment response, to ACE serum concentrations, as well as to hypertension, myocardial infarction and CVD risk markers. The mostly investigated ACE Ins/Del polymorphism accounts for ~40%-50% of the ACE serum concentration variance, the remaining half is probably determined by other genetic, environmental or epigenetic factors, but these are poorly understood. The main aim of the present study was the analysis of the DNA methylation pattern in the regulatory region of the ACE gene in peripheral leukocytes of 81 MD patients and 81 healthy controls. We detected intensive DNA methylation within a recently described, functional important region of the ACE gene promoter including hypermethylation in depressed patients (p = 0.008) and a significant inverse correlation between the ACE serum concentration and ACE promoter methylation frequency in the total sample (p = 0.02). Furthermore, a significant inverse correlation between the concentrations of the inflammatory CVD risk markers ICAM-1, E-selectin and P-selectin and the degree of ACE promoter methylation in MD patients could be demonstrated (p = 0.01 - 0.04). The results of the present study suggest that aberrations in ACE promoter DNA methylation may be an underlying cause of MD and probably a common pathogenic factor for the bi-directional relationship between MD and cardiovascular disorders

Resveratrol Decreases TXNIP mRNA and Protein Nuclear Expressions With an Arterial Function Improvement in Old Mice

Aging leads to a high prevalence of glucose intolerance and cardiovascular diseases, with oxidative stress playing a potential role. Resveratrol has shown promising effects on glucose tolerance and tends to improve endothelial function in elderly patients. Thioredoxin-interacting protein (TXNIP) was recently proposed as a potential link connecting glucose metabolism to oxidative stress. Here, we investigated the resveratrol-induced improvement of arterial aging phenotype in old mice and the expression of aortic TXNIP. Using an in vivo model of old mice with or without 3-month resveratrol treatment, we investigated the effects of resveratrol on age-related impairments from a cardiovascular Doppler analysis, to a molecular level, by studying inflammation and oxidative stress factors. We found a dual effect of resveratrol, with a decrease of age-related glucose intolerance and oxidative stress imbalance leading to reduced matrix remodeling that forestalls arterial aging phenotype in terms of intima-media thickness and arterial distensibility. These results provide the first evidence that aortic TXNIP mRNA and protein nuclear expressions are increased in the arterial aging and decreased by resveratrol treatment. In conclusion, we demonstrated that resveratrol helped to restore several aging impaired processes in old mice, with a decrease of aortic TXNIP mRNA and protein nuclear expression

Prognostic value of comorbidity indices and lung diseases in early rheumatoid arthritis:a UK population-based study

We assessed comorbidity burden in people with RA at diagnosis and early disease (3 years) and its association with early mortality and joint destruction. The association between lung disease and mortality in RA is not well studied; we also explored this relationship.From a contemporary UK-based population (n = 1, 475 762) we identified a cohort with incident RA (n = 6591). The prevalence of comorbidities at diagnosis of RA and at 3 years was compared with age- and gender-matched controls (n = 6591). In individuals with RA we assessed the prognostic value of the Charlson Comorbidity Index and Rheumatic Disease Comorbidity Index calculated at diagnosis for all-cause mortality and joint destruction (with joint surgery as a surrogate marker). We separately evaluated the association between individual lung diseases [chronic obstructive pulmonary disease (COPD), asthma and interstitial lung disease] and mortality.Respiratory disease, cardiovascular disease, stroke, diabetes, previous fracture and depression were more common (P < 0.05) in patients with RA at diagnosis than controls. Comorbidity (assessed using RDCI) was associated with all-cause mortality in RA [adjusted hazard ratio (HR) 1.26, 95% CI 1.00–1.60]. There was no association with joint destruction. COPD, but not asthma, was associated with mortality (COPD HR 2.84, 95% CI 1.13–7.12).There is an excess burden of comorbidity at diagnosis of RA including COPD, asthma and interstitial lung disease. COPD is a major predictor of early mortality in early RA. Early assessment of comorbidity including lung disease should form part of the routine management of RA patients

High-protein-low-carbohydrate diet: deleterious metabolic and cardiovascular effects depend on age

High-protein-low-carbohydrate (HP-LC) diets have become widespread. Yet their deleterious consequences, especially on glucose metabolism and arteries, have already been underlined. Our previous study (2) has already shown glucose intolerance with major arterial dysfunction in very old mice subjected to an HP-LC diet. The hypothesis of this work was that this diet had an age-dependent deleterious metabolic and cardiovascular outcome. Two groups of mice, young and adult (3 and 6 mo old), were subjected for 12 wk to a standard or to an HP-LC diet. Glucose and lipid metabolism was studied. The cardiovascular system was explored from the functional stage with Doppler-echography to the molecular stage (arterial reactivity, mRNA, immunohistochemistry). Young mice did not exhibit any significant metabolic modification, whereas adult mice presented marked glucose intolerance associated with an increase in resistin and triglyceride levels. These metabolic disturbances were responsible for cardiovascular damages only in adult mice, with decreased aortic distensibility and left ventricle dysfunction. These seemed to be the consequence of arterial dysfunctions. Mesenteric arteries were the worst affected with a major oxidative stress, whereas aorta function seemed to be maintained with an appreciable role of cyclooxygenase-2 to preserve endothelial function. This study highlights for the first time the age-dependent deleterious effects of an HP-LC diet on metabolism, with glucose intolerance and lipid disorders and vascular (especially microvessels) and cardiac functions. This work shows that HP-LC lead to equivalent cardiovascular alterations, as observed in very old age, and underlines the danger of such diet

Poliomyelitis after Poliomyelitis: Lights and Shadows of the Eradication an Introduction

Not Available

El ¿(judeo) español? de Pisa a la luz de cuatro inventarios de finales del siglo XVII

There are still few studies on the Spanish of Italian Jews, particularly in diplomatic-character documentation. This work analyzes the linguistic modality found in four unpublished inventories located in Pisa, which cannot be considered as Judeo-Spanish but a variety of Spanish rather close to the peninsular one, in the anteroom of the imminent linguistic assimilation to Italian. Also, a critical presentation of these documents is proposed, following the line begun by Manuel Ariza when in 2012 he edited several 17th- Century notarial documents from Pisa.Aún son escasos los estudios sobre el español de la comunidad sefardí italiana en documentación diplomática. En este trabajo, por un lado, se analiza la modalidad lingüística presente en cuatro inventarios inéditos localizados en Pisa, que no se puede calificar de judeoespañol sino de un español afín al peninsular en la antesala de la inminente asimilación lingüística al italiano; y, por otro, se propone una presentación crítica de estos documentos, continuando la línea empezada por Manuel Ariza de edición de documentos notariales de Pisa del siglo XVII en 2012

Capitalist Formations of Enclosure: Space and the Extinction of the Commons

Despite their theoretical and political potential, recent debates on enclosure usually lack an effective consideration of how space is mobilized in the process of dispossession. This article connects the analysis of enclosure's general spatial rationality to a range of illustrations of its particular formations and procedures. Enclosure is understood as one of capitalism's “universal territorial equivalents”, a polymorphous technique with variegated expressions in time but also with a consistent logic that uses the spatial erosion of the commons to subsume non-commodified, self-managed social spaces. In response to the ever-changing nature of commoning, successive regimes of enclosure reshape the morphologies of deprivation and their articulation to other state and market apparatuses in order to meet shifting strategies of capital accumulation and social reproduction. Through a spatially nuanced account of these phenomena, I outline a tentative genealogy of enclosure formations that allows tracking diverse geographies of dispossession across different scales and regulatory contexts in various historical stages of capitalist development