FASHION SHOW

The Devil Wears Brera Fashion Show

Giovedì 18 giugno – ore 17

Accademia Di Belle Arti Di Brera

Ingresso  da via Fiori Oscuri, 4

Corridoio dell'aula 55 e Cortile Della Magnolia

L’Accademia di Belle Arti di Brera compie 250 anni: la sfilata del Biennio di Fashion Design celebra la creatività totale di un anno importante tra storia, tecnologia e sinergie olimpiche.

Il 18 giugno, gli storici corridoi e il suggestivo Cortile della Magnolia si aprono per un evento cross-mediale unico, interamente prodotto dalla scuola di fashion design, che unisce moda, visual art, musica e grandi collaborazioni internazionali.

In occasione del prestigioso traguardo dei suoi 250 anni di storia, l’Accademia di Belle Arti di Brera apre le sue porte alla città per uno degli appuntamenti più attesi dell’anno accademico. Giovedì 18 giugno alle ore 17:00, il cuore pulsante culturale del quartiere di Brera si trasformerà in una passerella d’eccezione ospitando la sfilata finale degli studenti del Biennio Specialistico in Fashion Design dal titolo The Devil wears Brera.

Il progetto incarna perfettamente lo spirito di contaminazione artistica di Brera, vedendo il coinvolgimento attivo e sinergico di altri dipartimenti chiave: Nuove Tecnologie dell’Arte e Progettazione delle Arti Applicate.

Il 2026 è un anno decisamente straordinario per l'istituzione. Oltre a celebrare il bicentenario e mezzo dalla sua fondazione, l’evento sarà l’occasione per far riecheggiare le forti sinergie che hanno visto i giovani designer di Brera protagonisti sulla scena internazionale. Durante la sfilata verranno infatti celebrati i prestigiosi progetti che hanno coinvolto gli studenti nel corso dell’anno, tra cui le partnership con Sony e con i Giochi Olimpici Invernali di Milano Cortina 2026, a testimonianza del ruolo centrale dell’Accademia come incubatore di talenti pronti per le grandi sfide globali.

Per info ed R.S.V.P.: Giuditta Amisano – giuditta.amisano@equipemilano.com – T. 02-34538354

LAUNCH OF IartNET PORTAL 

On 9 June 2026, the Accademia di Belle Arti di Brera will officially present the IartNET portal (www.iartnet.it), a new international platform dedicated to artistic research and the enhancement of the cultural heritage preserved within Italian Higher Education Institutions in the Arts, Music, Dance, Design, and Conservation (AFAM).

Speakers will include the project’s Scientific Coordinator Nicoletta Leonardi, General Advisors Giovanna Cassese and Goffredo Haus, together with the scientific coordinators of the partner institutions: Umberto Bellodi, Alessandro De Filippo, Luca Andrea Ludovico, Marcello Mazzetti, and Carlo Sassetti. 

The IartNET portal represents the central outcome of the PNRR project IartNET – An International Platform for Artistic Research and Cultural Heritage at Italian Higher Arts Education Institutions, promoted by the Brera Academy of Fine Arts as lead institution, in partnership with the Academy of Fine Arts of Carrara, the Academy of Fine Arts of Catania, the “Luca Marenzio” Conservatory of Music in Brescia, the Fondazione Accademia d’Arti e Mestieri dello Spettacolo Teatro alla Scala, and the University of Milan, in collaboration with an extensive network of approximately thirty Italian and European institutions.

Developed under the scientific coordination of Nicoletta Leonardi, IartNET is conceived as a shared space for research and knowledge exchange, fostering dialogue between Italian and international institutions and bringing historical heritage and contemporary artistic practices into conversation. The project contributes to redefining the role of AFAM institutions not only as places of education and training, but also as custodians of highly significant cultural heritage—much of it still little known—and as active centres of research, innovation, and cultural production.

The project builds upon and further develops the work carried out over recent decades by Giovanna Cassese on the recognition and enhancement of the historical and contemporary, tangible and intangible heritage of Academies, Conservatories, and ISIA institutions, as well as on the related artistic research and production within AFAM institutions. This work has been pursued through conferences, publications, and institutional initiatives inspired by the principles of the Faro Convention. The project also benefits from the scientific consultancy of Goffredo Haus in the development of the portal’s digital infrastructures and innovation strategies.

Based on the creation of an open and interconnected ecosystem, IartNET seeks to support innovation, strengthen research communities, and promote advanced educational pathways in line with European standards.

“The project stems from the awareness that AFAM institutions—the Italian system of higher education in the arts, music, dance, design, and conservation—preserve heritage of extraordinary historical and artistic value, much of which remains largely unknown and can now be returned to society through new tools of access and sharing. At the same time, these institutions have always been centres of research, experimentation, and cultural production, where the transmission of knowledge is intertwined with artistic creation. The objective is to bring these two dimensions—heritage and research—into dialogue, strengthening the role of these institutions within the international landscape, fostering European networks of collaboration, master’s and doctoral programmes, exchanges of expertise, and new modes of knowledge production and dissemination. In this sense, the IartNET portal is conceived as a permanent laboratory for research, accessibility, and cooperation.”

— Nicoletta Leonardi, Scientific Coordinator of IartNET, Brera Academy of Fine Arts

Accessible at iartnet.it, the portal has been conceived as an English-language open-access digital infrastructure designed to facilitate the international circulation of artistic research and make the heritage, projects, activities, and research practices of AFAM institutions widely accessible.

The portal also showcases the numerous research projects developed within the network, ranging from the digitisation and study of historical collections—including photographic archives, drawings, plaster cast collections, and documentary holdings—to the documentation and analysis of contemporary artistic production. In this way, heritage is not only preserved and enhanced but also reactivated as a living resource for research, education, and artistic creation.

The portal presents an initial selection of more than 3,000 cultural assets digitised according to the highest international standards and accompanied by newly created records containing up-to-date scholarly content. The platform was developed in response to the need to make a largely unpublished heritage accessible to both the general public and the scholarly community. The corpus, which is continuously expanding, is intended to progressively incorporate additional objects from collections and archives preserved across the various AFAM institutions.

The project places particular emphasis on inclusivity through a highly user-friendly interface and the adoption of the IIIF (International Image Interoperability Framework) technological standard. This solution enables the exploration of high-resolution images and allows users to examine documents in minute detail from any device.

Within the corpus, a significant nucleus of approximately 1,500 historical photographs from the Academies of Fine Arts of Milan and Carrara stands out. These photographs form part of a broader national project dedicated to the enhancement of teaching photography collections preserved in Italian art academies, developed in collaboration with ICCD (Central Institute for Catalogue and Documentation) and the Italian Society for the Study of Photography. The initiative has led to the cataloguing of approximately 30,000 photographs, now recognised not only as key resources for understanding the history of artistic education but also as exceptionally valuable museum objects. These holdings originate from the Academies of Fine Arts of Florence, Palermo, Turin, Milan, and Carrara. This nucleus is complemented by drawings—many previously unpublished—by Andrea Appiani, Napoleon’s premier peintre, as well as by historical plaster cast collections, painting collections, and the bibliographic and archival holdings preserved by the participating institutions.

Within an interdisciplinary framework open to dialogue between tradition and contemporaneity, this visual heritage intersects with the performing arts through videos, stage photographs, theatrical documents, and musical materials drawn from the Fondazione Accademia d’Arti e Mestieri dello Spettacolo Teatro alla Scala and the “Luca Marenzio” Conservatory of Music in Brescia.

The project extends into the present through original interviews with artists who formerly taught at AFAM institutions and with the institutions’ new doctoral candidates, produced by the Academy of Fine Arts of Catania. These testimonies highlight the central role of cultural heritage in shaping contemporary artistic practices and research trajectories.

With the launch of the portal, IartNET marks a decisive step towards a shared platform capable of connecting past and future, research and education, heritage and innovation, while strengthening the position of AFAM institutions within the European and international cultural landscape.

Alongside its digital dimension, the project contributes to the creation of an international hub for artistic research by connecting institutions, heritage collections, research practices, and diverse areas of expertise, thereby fostering new forms of interdisciplinary and interinstitutional collaboration.

The initiative forms part of the PNRR project IartNET – An International Platform for Artistic Research and Cultural Heritage at Italian Higher Arts Education Institutions, funded by the European Union – NextGenerationEU, Mission 4. 

For further information:
iartnet.ricerca@fadbrera.edu.it 

PRESENTAZIONE

Giovedì 28 maggio 2026, ore 17.00 Sala Napoleonica - Accademia di Belle Arti di Brera (Via Brera, 28 – Milano)

Nell’ambito delle celebrazioni per il 250° anniversario della sua fondazione, l’Accademia di Belle Arti di Brera annuncia una prestigiosa donazione che va ad arricchire l’importante corpus di opere neoclassiche già custodito dall’istituzione.

Si tratta dell’album di Giuseppe Vallardi, una preziosa raccolta di 380 disegni di Giuseppe Bossi e Andrea Appiani che integra e completa l’eccezionale patrimonio storico del Palazzo Braidense.

INTERNATIONAL COLLOQUIUM 

The Accademia di Belle Arti di Brera presents the international colloquium, The Lives and Afterlives of Teaching Collections: Art Academies as Laboratories of Cultural Heritage, brings together historians, conservators, and artists to reflect on the material, institutional, and intellectual legacies of academic teaching collections.

From their establishment, and especially during the eighteenth and From their establishment, and particularly during the eighteenth and nineteenth centuries, European art academies assembled extensive collections of paintings, sculptures, photographs, books, plaster casts, drawings, prints, and a wide range of instruments. Conceived as institutions for the training of artists and artisans, they developed complex pedagogical ecosystems in which making, copying, and observing were profoundly intertwined. In many cases, these holdings were closely connected to – or even constituted the nucleus of – newly founded museums of decorative and industrial arts, transforming the academy itself into a laboratory where teaching, research, and exhibition converged.

Over the course of the twentieth century, however, many of these collections suffered neglect, dispersal, or even destruction, particularly following modernist and neo-avant-garde critiques of academic tradition. Once central pedagogical and research devices and powerful instruments of cultural and ideological transmission, they gradually became marginal both within artistic practice and within art-historical scholarship.

The colloquium reconsiders academic teaching collections not as obsolete remnants, but as critical witnesses to the evolving relationships between pedagogy, heritage, and cultural identity. Established within the universalist paradigms of the Western canon, these collections now invite renewed interpretation through contemporary historiographic perspectives. Viewed in this light, they reveal complex material and epistemic histories shaped by fragmentation, displacement, reinterpretation, and institutional transformation.

Adopting a comparative and transnational perspective, the colloquium examines shared dynamics and local specificities across central European contexts, with particular attention to the gendered, colonial, and national frameworks that shaped the production, circulation, and interpretation of didactic models and copies. It also addresses the intertwined lives and afterlives of teaching materials, tracing their transformation from tools of artistic formation into cultural artefacts and heritage assets. At the same time, it considers how study collections illuminate broader questions of absence, power, and representation, while emerging fields of inquiry open new perspectives on these materials, situating them within contemporary cultural debates.

A central focus will be the historical moments through which these collections were produced, transformed, or damaged. Events, conservation histories, and institutional trajectories mark each collection as a distinct material sedimentation of time, while processes of loss and destabilisation provide a crucial interpretive lens through which their meanings and uses can be reconsidered.

By fostering dialogue among historians, conservators, and artists, The Lives and Afterlives of Teaching Collections: Art Academies as Laboratories of Cultural Heritage seeks to reactivate the legacy of art academies as living laboratories of knowledge and creativity. The colloquium will examine how these collections may be studied, preserved, and reimagined today—linking historical pedagogies with contemporary artistic practices while opening new perspectives for research, documentation, and critical reflection within higher arts education.

The initiative is part of the PNRR project INTAFAM IartNET – an international platform for artistic research and cultural heritage at Italian higher arts education institutions funded by the European Union – NextGenerationEU, Mission 4, led by the Accademia di Belle Arti di Brera and coordinated by Nicoletta Leonardi. 

For information: iartnet.ricerca@fadbrera.edu.it

OPEN DAY – Vieni a conoscere l’Accademia di Belle Arti di Brera

Sabato 16 maggio 2026, dalle ore 9:00 alle 13:00, l’Accademia di Belle Arti di Brera invita studentesse e studenti, appassionati e curiosi a vivere un’esperienza diretta all’interno dei propri spazi, per conoscere da vicino l’Offerta Formativa e i percorsi di studio.

L’Accademia si distingue per un approccio didattico dinamico e sperimentale, che integra le discipline artistiche tradizionali con le più recenti innovazioni. La formazione valorizza la ricerca sui linguaggi contemporanei, l’uso di nuovi materiali e tecnologie, e l’esplorazione delle tecniche audiovisive, promuovendo al tempo stesso la progettazione artistica, la comunicazione visiva e la valorizzazione del patrimonio culturale.

Durante l’Open Day sarà possibile incontrare docenti, studenti e tecnici di laboratorio, che guideranno i partecipanti alla scoperta delle diverse Scuole, dei corsi e dei possibili sbocchi professionali. Il personale amministrativo sarà inoltre a disposizione per fornire informazioni su iscrizioni, borse di studio, tasse e contributi.

L’iniziativa si svolgerà in presenza presso la sede centrale dell’Accademia, in via Brera 28 – Milano, e presso l’Ex Chiesa di San Carpoforo, in via Formentini 12, a pochi passi dalla sede principale.

L’ingresso è libero e senza prenotazione. Non sono previsti collegamenti online.

Il programma completo della mattinata è disponibile in fondo alla pagina.

CICLO DI CONFERENZE

In occasione delle celebrazioni per il 250° anniversario dell' Accademia di Brera, la Commissione Cultura presenta un primo ciclo di 5 conferenze dedicate all'Architettura e al Design. A partire dalla sua fondazione l'Accademia vede nell'insegnamento della progettazione uno dei suoi primi obiettivi. Ripercorreremo questo tragitto attraverso alcuni protagonisti dell'architettura contemporanea, e con il supporto di una ampia panoramica storica. A cura di Fabio Iannotta e Massimo Kaufmann. 

Mario Cucinella

Founder and Creative Director MCA – Mario Cucinella Architects

Venerdì 15 maggio 2026, ore 17.00

Sala Napoleonica

Stefano Boeri

Architetto e urbanista, Docente del Politecnico di Milano

Mercoledì 20 maggio 2026, ore 17.00

Sala Napoleonica

Maria Vittoria Capitanucci

Docente di teoria e storia dell’Architettura Contemporanea, Politecnico di Milano

Venerdì 22 maggio 2026, ore 15.00

Sala Napoleonica

Ugo La Pietra

Artista, Designer e Architetto

Fondatore della Scuola di Progettazione Artistica per l’Impresa, Accademia di Brera

Venerdì 29 maggio 2026, ore 15.30

Sala Napoleonica

Juan Josè Lahuerta

Docente presso la Scuola Tecnica Superiore di Architettura di Barcellona

Venerdì 5 giugno 2026, ore 17.00

Sala Napoleonica

RASSEGNA CINEMATOGRAFICA

La quindicesima edizione della rassegna Cinema e Arte si presenta al pubblico di Brera con un'attitudine dinamica. Da una parte intendiamo sviluppare le premesse dello scorso anno, prima di tutto mostrando i lavori video dei migliori ragazzi e delle migliori ragazze dell’Accademia che hanno scelto la via espressiva dell’immagine in movimento, ma al contempo tentando di sondare le sorprendenti, inattese potenzialità creative delle ‘intelligenze artificiali’ in stato nascente. L’intento è illuminare quantomeno alcuni tra i poli tematici che sembrano attirare e attivare gli artisti e le artiste più giovani, in contesti che richiedono la comprensione del presente e la proiezione nelle sfide del futuro, ma alla luce degli avvenimenti del passato.

Ecco così le nostre Urbanità Divergenti (o meglio Antipodissea, cioè un'Odissea degli Antipodi o gli Antipodi dell'Odissea), quindi i nostri scenari urbani tra l’Europa, l’Occidente e il Mediterraneo inteso come porta sui mondi. Queste divengenze si aprono col caso del cinema più multirazziale tra i film di Luchino Visconti (di cui ricorrono cinquant'anni dalla morte) e precisamente Lo straniero, tratto nel 1967 dal romanzo di Camus e ambientato ad Algeri.

Seguono altre intense storie mediterranee, tra cui quella girata da Mario Martone nel 1996 tra i rifugiati Saharawi del cosiddetto Sahara Spagnolo, e il documentario sui lavori fatti da Pina Bausch sulle musiche di Gluck e Stravinski in Senegal. Non mancano gli esordi inaspettati, tra la Maremma e Trastevere, di un regista di genere come Umberto Lenzi. Fra i più giovani le proposte muovono dalle visioni su Milano e su Napoli, su antiche e quasi dimenticate tecniche di pesca in mare, su un universo sempre più dialettico e artisticamente consapevole, che ingloba realtà inaspettate come i progetti di Feltrinelli per l’insurrezione in Sardegna e la presenza di un alligatore e di una tigre del Bengala in un appartamento di Manhattan.