Barbara Jatta appointed director of Vatican Museums

Barbara Jatta, currently head of the Prints Cabinet at the Vatican Apostolic Library, has been named the new director of the Vatican Museums. She will officially assume the role in six months, during which she will serve as deputy director alongside Antonio Paolucci, who has led the museums since 2007. Paolucci, former superintendent of the Florentine museum system and culture minister under the Dini government, was appointed by Pope Benedict XVI. Jatta, born in Rome in 1962, earned a degree in Literature with a thesis on the history of drawing, engraving, and graphic arts in 1986 from La Sapienza University, followed by a specialization in Art History in 1991. She completed internships in England, Portugal, and the United States. From 1981 to 1996, she worked at the Istituto Nazionale per la Grafica as a restorer and cataloguer of drawings, engravings, woodcuts, and lithographs. Since the 1990s, she has taught at various institutions and since 1994 has held the course on History of Graphic Techniques and Arts at the University of Suor Orsola Benincasa in Naples. In 1996, she became head of the Prints Cabinet at the Vatican Apostolic Library, where she also serves on exhibition, acquisitions, and cataloguing committees. On September 8, 2010, Pope Benedict XVI appointed her Curator of Prints at the library. Jatta has organized numerous exhibitions and contributed to editorial projects in graphic and art history.