Costruirsi un’identità tra arte e medicina: Giuseppe Chiappi e la ceroplastica anatomica tra Sette e Ottocento

The paper deals with the professional life and work of an Italian artist, Giuseppe Chiappi, who produced anatomical wax models in different parts of Italy, Europe, and the United States between the 18th and 19th centuries. Chiappi developed different strategies to affirm his role as an expert of the anatomical knowledge of the human body and to convince his potential clientele that his models were fine artistic objects as much as accurate scientific representations. The paper reconstructs the changes of these strategies as Chiappi moved from Italy to the US, offering a contribution to the historical discussion of professional identities and the relationship between art and medicine in the modern period.