1911 Pavon / Garroni Pictorial View of Rome

The Many Monuments of the Eternal City.

This is a rare c. 1911 chromolithographed pictorial bird's-eye view of Rome, Italy, prepared by Oreste Garroni and printed by Pavon. It was published to celebrate the 50th anniversary of the unification of Italy, the culmination of the Risorgimento, as well as the city's co-hosting of the Esposizione nazionale and hosting of the Esposizione internazionale d'arte that same year. More generally, it highlights Rome's remarkable growth and modernization following its designation as national capital.

A Closer Look

This view is oriented toward the south, with the northern suburbs of Rome in the foreground and the city's southern hinterland, with nearby towns (Tivoli, Albano, etc.) in the background. The exposition grounds for the Esposizione nazionale appear at the bottom-right, just beyond the rione of Prati, in the suburban area then known as Piazza d'Armi and now called Della Vittoria. An index of pavilions (padiglioni) representing different regions of Italy is included. At the bottom-left, in the Vigna Cartoni (Valle Giulia) on the opposite bank of the Tiber from the Piazza d'Armi, were the grounds of the International Art Exhibition, with pavilions mostly representing other European countries, along with the U.S.A., Egypt, and Japan. The two concurrent exhibitions were fairly coordinated on opposite banks of the Tiber, unified by the new Ponte del Risorgimento (here as Ponte Flaminia). Beyond the exhibition facilities in the foreground, the view labels roads, illustrates landmarks throughout the city, and traces the city's streetcar lines, suburban electric railways, and omnibus routes.

The Year of Two Exhibitions

Organized to commemorate the semicentennial of Italian unification in 1911, the Esposizione internazionale d'arte at Valle Giulia and the national exhibitions, headlined by the ethnographic Mostra delle Regioni at Piazza d'Armi, functioned as complementary halves of an ideological program designed to assert Italy's standing as a modern European power and Rome's place as its showcase capital. Rather than concentrating events in a single fairground, the organizers devised a polycentric plan that fundamentally altered Rome's urban periphery. The festivities catalyzed expansion into the Flaminio District in the city's northern suburbs, spurred the construction of Cesare Bazzani's permanent Palazzo delle Belle Arti (now the Galleria Nazionale d'Arte Moderna), and physically unified the riverbanks via the pioneering Ponte del Risorgimento, an engineering landmark built in reinforced concrete to seamlessly bridge the international pavilions in Valle Giulia with the national fairgrounds across the Tiber. The exhibitions also helped to solidify the Museo Nazionale Romano, which had been officially established in 1889, but had long struggled with inadequate, fragmented facilities.

More broadly, the view reflects Rome's modernization after its transfer from the administration of the Papal States to the Kingdom of Italy. Following its annexation as Italy's capital, Rome underwent a sweeping transformation into a secular, modern metropolis, carving broad thoroughfares like Via Nazionale through the historic core, erecting massive ministerial complexes, and constructing the imposing Tiber embankments (muraglioni) to tame perennial flooding. While early development was plagued by unchecked real estate speculation and the banking crash of 1887, orderly modernization resumed under the mayoralty of Ernesto Nathan (1907 - 1913). Nathan's administration municipalized critical infrastructure, including the tramways and electrical grid. It adopted the 1909 Sanjust Plan, which curbed developer cartels by introducing zoned development, public housing, and regulated outward growth beyond the historical center, as the population swelled from some 200,000 in 1870 to over half a million.

This rapid demographic surge breached the ancient Aurelian Walls, rendering the traditional, centuries-old system of rioni incapable of governing the sprawling periphery. To address this, the municipal council passed a resolution in 1911 establishing the first fifteen quartieri, creating an administrative framework for the newly urbanized ring outside the historic center. This restructuring codified early twentieth-century Rome's socioeconomic geography: northern and western sectors like Flaminio, Parioli, and Pinciano were developed as affluent, green residential districts integrated with the 1911 exhibitions, while industrial facilities, transit yards, and working-class settlements were systematically organized along eastern and southern corridors such as Ostiense and Tiburtino.

Chromolithography

Chromolithography, sometimes called oleography, is a color lithographic technique developed in the mid-19th century. The process involved using multiple lithographic stones, one for each color, to yield a rich composite effect. Oftentimes, the process would start with a black basecoat upon which subsequent colors were layered. Some chromolithographs used 30 or more separate lithographic stones to achieve the desired product. Chromolithograph color could also be effectively blended for even more dramatic results. The process became extremely popular in the late 19th and early 20th centuries when it emerged as the dominant method of color printing. The vivid color chromolithography produced made it exceptionally effective for advertising and propaganda imagery.

Publication History and Census

This map was printed by Cromolitografia Pavon (also as Cromolitografia G. Pavon), a seemingly short-lived firm active in the early 1910s, and was published by Oreste Garroni in Rome. The title of the work is somewhat ambiguous, most likely referring to the 50th anniversary of the unification of Italy (1861) but perhaps referring to the 50th anniversary of the designation of Rome as the national capital (1871). As both Pavon and Oreste Garroni were most active in the early 1910s, the former is the more likely. The early representation of the Monumento a Vittorio Emanuele II complex (which began construction in 1911 but was not fully completed until 23 years later), which differs notably from its final configuration, would also support the earlier date. The only potential match for this map that we have found in institutional collections is cataloged under a slightly different title ('Plianta di Roma e dell'esposizione 1911: 50. anniversario della proclamazione dell regni d'Italia') at the Freie Universität Berlin.

Cartographer

Oreste Garroni (fl. c. 1872 - 1930) was a Rome-based publisher active at the turn of the 20th century. He was the likely founder of a family firm begun as a bookstore (Libreria O. Garroni) in Rome in the early 1870s, which began publishing in its own right by the late 1870s, focusing initially on government publications. The firm appears to have included multiple family members in addition to O. Garroni (F. Ev. Garroni, L. Garroni, Adolfo Garroni), who were likely brothers, as it operated as Garroni Fratelli for a time in the early to mid-1880s. From the late 1890s, the firm consistently utilized the name Oreste Garroni, suggesting the other brothers had died or moved on to other endeavors. In this period (the early 20th century), the firm was known as a publisher of affordable and accessible works on Italian literature, poetry, and drama, particularly a series of pocket-sized books titled 'Piccola biblioteca utile' that included classic works by Renaissance masters like Dante and Giovanni Boccaccio, and a similar series of classic plays titled 'Biblioteca teatrale economica.' Around 1914, the firm began using the name Stabilimento Tipografico Riccardo Garroni, or, more often, Stabilimento Tipografico Garroni, suggesting a change in leadership, likely a new generation of the family. From the mid-1920s, the firm operated simply as Tipografico Garroni and appears to have ceased publishing in 1930 or soon thereafter. Throughout its history, under various iterations of the company's name, it was located at 55 Via Nazionale, near the Palazzo delle Esposizioni.   Further Details...

Condition

Good. Light wear along original fold lines. Verso repairs to fold separations and at fold intersections. Slight loss at a few fold intersections. Closed margin tears professionally repaired on verso.

References

OCLC 918283120 (possible match, slightly different title).