GLAM/Newsletter/January 2026/Contents/Italy report

This Month in GLAM – Volume XVI, Issue I, January 2026

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Italy report

Knowledge in action: Barindelli collection and Wikipedia 25

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Unlocking a century of opera history: the Barindelli collection goes global

A unique archive of 20th-century opera history is finding new life online thanks to a collaboration between the Municipality of Esino Lario, the family of collector Tino Barindelli, and Wikimedia Italia.

The Tino Barindelli collection consists of photographs and letters gathered over decades by a passionate music lover and correspondent of opera singers and conductors. Barindelli’s nieces donated the archive to the Municipality of Esino Lario and actively supported its digitization, with the shared goal of releasing the materials in open access on Wikimedia Commons and making them available for research and public engagement.

The collection includes over a thousand items, mainly dedicated photographs of opera singers and conductors—often produced by major theatres during opera productions—dating largely from the 1940s to the 1960s. Many are accompanied by handwritten notes, cards, or letters sent to Barindelli in response to his correspondence. A significant portion of these materials was previously undocumented and difficult to access.

As of 28 January 2026, 965 digitized images from the Barindelli collection are available on Wikimedia Commons. Of these, 570 files (59%) are already in use across Wikimedia projects, appearing 1,942 times on 1,853 Wikipedia pages in 55 languages and generating more than 230,000 monthly views. The images illustrate biographies of internationally active artists—sopranos, mezzosopranos, tenors, baritones, basses, and conductors—many of whom performed leading roles in productions at major opera houses, including La Scala in Milan.

Work began in 2025 with an initial batch of around 200 soprano portraits. In 2026, volunteer editors and Wikimedia Italia staff are processing the rest of the collection. Beyond uploads to Commons, the project includes creating and improving Wikidata items for the artists and, where possible, extracting and documenting autographs and signatures visible in the materials.

By preserving fragile originals and sharing them openly, the Barindelli collection is now supporting musicological research, education, and the illustration of Wikimedia content worldwide—bringing mid-20th-century opera culture to new audiences in dozens of languages.

See the full Commons category here

Celebrating 25 years of Wikipedia: cultural institutions at the heart of knowledge sharing

On 15 January 2026, Wikipedia turned 25, a milestone celebrated worldwide. In Italy, the national celebration took place on 18 January at the Museo Nazionale del Risorgimento Italiano in Turin, alongside the awards for Wiki Loves Monuments Italy 2025 and Wiki Loves Monuments Piemonte 2025.

While the event highlighted the achievements of the Wikipedia community, it also showcased the vital role that cultural institutions play in making knowledge accessible. Representatives from museums, libraries, universities, and theatres shared concrete examples of collaboration with Wikimedia Italia, illustrating how GLAM institutions can unlock their collections for public benefit.

The session dedicated to cultural institutions opened with a welcome from Luisa Papotti, President of the Museo Nazionale del Risorgimento Italiano, who introduced the contributions from GLAM partners.

Alessandro Bollo, Director of the Museo Nazionale del Risorgimento Italiano and former Director of the Polo del Novecento in Turin, reflected on the transformative potential of Wikimedia projects for museums. He highlighted how training staff, empowering archivists and librarians, and opening archives to wider audiences can make a real impact. Bollo also recalled that in 2020, while leading the Polo del Novecento, his institution was the first to be awarded a Wikimedia Italia GLAM grant with the “A Wikipedian in Residence at your museum” project. He cited then the “Wikipedia meets Risorgimento” editathon, where researchers, students, and volunteers improved Wikipedia articles, added references, and uploaded images in a single morning, as an example of the tangible outcomes of such collaborations.

Enrico Bertacchini, from the University of Turin, highlighted data-driven projects like Wiki Loves Monuments and the “Empowering Italian GLAMs – Tutti i musei su Wikipedia” initiative, showing how Wikipedia can boost visibility for museums and smaller institutions that lack extensive online resources.

Sandra Migliore and Cecilia Cognigni shared how libraries and university archives in Turin leveraged GLAM grants to digitize historical materials, create Wikipedia articles, and make previously inaccessible documents and images openly available. Their work demonstrates the power of Wikimedia projects to connect local heritage with global audiences.

Enrico Ferraris of the Museo Egizio emphasized the importance of positioning cultural institutions as active nodes in a larger knowledge ecosystem, sharing images and engaging staff through editathons to transform collections into accessible, structured digital content.

Simone Solinas from Teatro Regio presented one of the most recent initiatives: through the MAB grant, over 2,000 resources—including sketches, figurines, and costume designs from productions since the 1960s—were digitized, described, and released on Wikimedia projects, often before they were available in the theatre’s own systems. This collaboration illustrates how institutions can preserve their heritage while immediately making it usable for education, research, and public engagement.

These testimonies offer a vivid snapshot of the human and institutional dedication that sustains the Wikimedia ecosystem.

In this issue

January 2026

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