Museum of Tactile Painting

The Museum of Tactile Antique and Modern Painting, Anteros, was founded by the Istituto Cavazza in September 1999, and was inaugurated in the year 2000. It represents a unique experience in its genre in Europe. It exhibits tridimentional reproductions of works of art by famous painters in Art History. These were designed and developed by the Associazione Scuola di Scultura Applicata of Bologna (School of Applied Sculpture of Bologna).

The tridimentional reproductions are accompanied by preparatory information material on historical styles and descriptive specification sheets, which are translated in braille. These provide visitors with information on stylistic and iconographic context of each work of art, guiding them in their tactile exploration of the raised design. 

The goal of the Anteros Museum is to become in itself a useful tactile "manual", gathering and disseminating knowledge of the historical and esthetic value in painting.

For non sighted and sighted persons

The Anteros Museum holds courses in Art History, and interpretation methodology, which are designed to teach both blind and sighted persons. Moreover, there are research projects relating to the cognitive processes involved in decoding images by blind and visually impaired persons. Various visits and initiatives take place at the Museum, as well as collaboration projects with important universities, educational institutions, and organizations. It offers individual visitors and groups personalized guiding and lessons.

For persons who are blind or visually impaired, to discover the mind's imaginative and cognitive potential means to knowledgeably and serenely develop one's own interpretative independance, and the strength of visual thinking. This is achieved, in part, thanks to proper sensory integration, and tactile refinement and perceptions.

To acquire knowledge of painting means to be introduced to composition, to perspective tridimentional space of formal values of which structures are composed of. It is clear that this information, which is accessible by the sense of touch, excludes notions of colour. However, it is possible to provide these notions with chromatic intervention on the raised design, or ulterior methods, to persons who have low vision, or who became blind at a later age.

The importance of acquiring knowledge about art, marrying senses with intellect, is true also for persons who are sighted. Sighted visitors of the Anteros Museum discover that seeing with the hands strengthens understanding, and that linking sight with touch results in the rehabilitation of a sense which is too ofen inhibited. 

To know how to see with the hands and touch with the eyes means, whether for blind or sighted persons, that preconceptions cease to be an issue in order to freely learn about the real beauty of things.

Museological Research, Information Gathering and Dissemination

Activities at the Anteros Museum revolve around museological research, information gathering and dissemination, and updating educational ressources. The Istituto Cavazza has been for some time rigourously applying the method of teaching the blind and visually impaired about images, through theoretical and practical lessons. Its goal is to teach about Art History as a story of shape transformation, of phenomenology of vision and perception; a story of styles, ideas, iconography and iconology. In order to complete theoretical aspects, lessons and exercises in a lab allow the realization of projects in raised design and plastic works with which it is possible to experience a degree of understanding of iconical shapes, as well as the cognitive-interpretative and active-expressive nature of the students who are involved in this type of activity.

International Conference

In order to create an international platform of exchange in relation to art and museum-related interests for persons who are blind, an international conference took place in the year 2001 entitled: Tactile Perception and Cognition of Artistic Form by Blind and Visually Impaired Persons - Interpretative Act and Rehabilitation Role. The conference, which took place at the CNR of Bologna, was organized by the Istituto Cavazza, the Italian Blind Union, the National Federation of Institutions for the Blind, and the Italian Library for the Blind Regina Margherita of Monza. Renowed psychologists, and representatives of international museums attented this conference, among them the Louvre in Paris and the Metropolitan Museum in New York.

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