In Fall of 2025, the University of Arkansas’ Fulbright College of Arts and Sciences announced the development of the Professor Antonio Marinoni and Rosa Zagnoni Marinoni Endowed Chair in Italian. The $1.5 million gift was made by the Marinoni family to the University of Arkansas in honour of their grandparents, both of whom played an enormous role in developing the literary and cultural scene of North West Arkansas. As part of a wider events program which celebrated the creation of the Endowed Chair in Italian, I worked with fellow students to curate an exhibit honouring the lives of its namesakes.
The title “Radici (Roots)” was chosen in recognition of the Italian heritage shared by both couples. Its subtitle, “Italian Roots, Arkansan Soil”, highlighted the vast differences in the cultures and locations the Marinoni family navigated. These somewhat diasporic themes informed our curatorial choices.
Individually, the title of the exhibit denoted Professor Antonio Marinoni’s work as a translator. After studying classical and romance languages at the University of Padua and later at Yale University, Antonio Marinoni earned a graduate degree in Latin and penned An Italian Reader: With Notes and Vocabulary in the late 1890s.
The title also invokes the poetic imagery utilised by Rosa Zagnoni Marinoni, the state of Arkansas’ second ever Poet Laureate. Over 1,000 of her short stories were published in 70 magazines throughout her lifetime and her poems were published in more than 900 U.S. and international publications. Given this incredibly impressive span of work, we focused on poems such as “Clandestine Love” and the themes of diaspora and upheaval it expressed.
On the 2nd October at 1:30 PM, the Radici/Roots Exhibit was unveiled in the Special Collections gallery at the University of Arkansas.
