Luisa Levi D’Ancona Modena (PhD Cambridge University) is an Italian/Israeli social historian living in Jerusalem. Her research focuses on the history of Jewish philanthropy in Italy, politics, and gender. She is affiliated to the European Forum of the Hebrew University of Jerusalem, to the University of Oxford, and with the Intellettuali in fuga dall’Italia fascista project of the University of Florence. Her work bridges both strands of the Jewish Country Houses project in Italy, but focuses particularly on philanthropy and politics, building on her long-standing research interests in Jewish elites, philanthropy, family and women in Liberal Italy and Western Europe. She is working with Silvia Davoli to develop the Italian dimension of the Jewish Country Houses project.
Relevant publications:
Donne ebree filantrope del tessile:lavoro, arte e tradizione nell'Italia liberale e oltre, in Donne ebree protagoniste tra il XIX e XX secolo, edited by Elisa Bianchi and Paola Vita Finzi, (Milano, Guerini, 2023), pp.63-81.
The “Beautiful Enigma.” A case study of German-Jewish women in art collector networks in Rome (1880-1914), Journal for the History of Collections, vol. 34/3 (2022), pp. 507–519
Baronesses and revolutionaries: the activism of foreign-born Jewish women in Liberal Italy, in Journal of Modern Jewish Studies, 2021, pp.1-24
Giving and dying in Liberal Italy: Jewish men and women in Italian culture wars, in Jews, Liberalism, Anti-Semitism: Towards a New History, edited by Abigail Green and Simon Levis Sullam, (London, Palgrave, 2020), pp.153-181
Italian-Jewish Patrons of Modern Art in 19th and 20th C. Italy, in Ars Judaica, 16/1 (2020), pp.3-29.
Prospero Moisè Loria: a case study of Jewish secularism in Liberal Italy, Jewish History, 32 (2018), pp.1-18.
Books edited:
La Nostra Vita con Ezio e Ricordi di Guerra, by Flora Aghib Levi D’Ancona , Florence, Florence University Press, 2021
Jane Bensaude, Memorie, Florence, Florence University Press, 2016.
