Rievocare le conquiste della scienza: il museo di Palazzo Poggi a Bologna

This contribution takes into consideration a particular example of period room: one dedicated to science. In the university museum of the Palazzo Poggi in Bologna, the academics of the Institute of Sciences (the very young Francesco Algarotti to be precise) in 1729 successfully replicated an experiment on the dispersion of light – honed for the first time ever by Isaac Newton – achieving a re-evocation of that very same experience. In the course of the museum visit, the visitor has access to this atmosphere and nds him- or herself immersed in a darkened space, where a ray of light enters from the same hole used by the academics in the eighteenth century and is projected onto a white surface to reveal its chromatic spectrum. In this context, the visitor re-experiences Newton’s experiment concretely and tangibly. Ultimately, Newton’s room possesses a narrative dimension capable of fully involving the visitor, who thus becomes the spectator and witness to an experience that is actualized before his or her very eyes.