UPF Center for Vattimo’s Philosophy and Archives

Gianni Vattimo’s archives were inaugurated on June 6, 2016 at the auditorium of the Ciutadella Campus of Pompeu Fabra University. The archives, donated by Professor Vattimo (University of Turin), consist of his university courses, seminars, notes, letters, and unpublished material. Given Vattimo’s numerous appearances on television, from cultural debates to courses on national television, the archives also include many audio and visual recordings. They are located in the General Library of UPF (in the center of Dipòsit de les Aigües Building) which offers a privileged work setting for any researcher. The UPF Center for Vattimo’s Philosophy and Archives, besides being in charge of classifying, together with the Library’s Staff, the archives, also organizes international conferences, seminars and workshops in order to promote the Italian thinker’s philosophy in relation to art, religion, politics, and science.

Gianni Vattimo (born Turin, Italy, 1936) is emeritus professor of philosophy at the University of Turin and a former member of the European Parliament. He studied in Turin under the existentialist Luigi Pareyson and graduated in 1959. After studying with Karl Löwith and Hans-Georg Gadamer in Heidelberg, he became assistant professor (1964) and later full professor of Aesthetics (1969), and finally full professor of Theoretical Philosophy (1982-2009) at the University of Turin, where he also served, in the Seventies, as dean of the Faculty of Letters and Philosophy. He has been a visiting professor at several American universities (Yale, Los Angeles, New York University, Columbia University, State University of New York); he has led academic seminars and given lectures all around the world, and received many honorary degrees from numerous universities worldwide. Vattimo is Grand Officer of Merit of the Italian Republic (1997), member of the Accademia delle Scienze in Turin, was awarded the Max Planck Research Award, the Hannah Arendt Prize for Political Thinking in 2002, and the Georgetown President Medal in 2006; in 2008 he delivered the prestigious Gifford Lectures at the University of Glasgow. Besides being member of the scientific committees of a number of international academic journals, Vattimo has been a columnist of various Italian (La Stampa, l’Espresso, l’Europeo, Il Manifesto, l’Unità, Il Fatto Quotidiano and foreign (The Guardian, El País, Clarín among others) newspapers. His books have been translated into over twenty languages and influenced generations of philosophers throughout the world.