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Jennifer Ashby @jenniferashby.bsky.social · 7d

Weekend walk

Sunset over Florence, Italy. Blue skies over a panorama of the city. The cupola if the Duomo is noticeable but many other buildings of the Renaissance centre are visible.

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Jennifer Ashby @jenniferashby.bsky.social · 10d

Annoys me that it absolutely is going to get cited and circulated despite being wildly inaccurate.

Jennifer Ashby @jenniferashby.bsky.social · 10d

Reading a new chapter by an anglophone senior academic for a major academic pub house which compares an Italian & English thinker. They clearly don't know Italian, don't cite the Italian's writings (not translated), & show no awareness of their bio or context, just vague. How is this still ok?

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Jennifer Ashby @jenniferashby.bsky.social · 14d

Long story, recommend having a search. But Roberto Assagioli was an Italian psychiatrist who was fascinated with psychology & the inner life but was dissatisfied with Freud. He developed his own self-development practice called Psychosynthesis which is about harmonising the Self (mystical elements).

Reposted by Jennifer Ashby

Jennifer Ashby @jenniferashby.bsky.social · 14d

Last week I attended the 11th International Psychosynthesis Meeting at the final home of Roberto Assagioli. Met some fascinating people & spent a lot of time in the archives! His office remains as it was when he died. The house is not a museum tho - it's an active centre for practitioners still.

Office of Roberto Assagioli in the Institute of Psychosynthesis, Florence, Italy. There are a range of catalogued books as well as archival boxes and a desk in the centre of the room.

Olga Fröbe-Kapteyn artwork gifted to roberto Assagioli. On the top of a chest of draws is an amethyst crystal as well as two of Assagioli's handprinted evocative words.

Archival boxes, a lucky horse shoe, and a series of spheres.

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Jennifer Ashby @jenniferashby.bsky.social · 14d

His diagram of the consciousness took the form of ovoid shape so of course there were lots of egg-shaped candles & one morning we have the opportunity to print an "evocative word" with his own wood blocks.

Egg shaped candle burning surrounded by flowers.

Lots of painted pieces of papers on a round table with wood block stamps in the centre.

Jennifer Ashby @jenniferashby.bsky.social · 14d

Last week I attended the 11th International Psychosynthesis Meeting at the final home of Roberto Assagioli. Met some fascinating people & spent a lot of time in the archives! His office remains as it was when he died. The house is not a museum tho - it's an active centre for practitioners still.

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Jennifer Ashby @jenniferashby.bsky.social · 15d

There's an amazing range of books from psychology through to psychical research, studies on mysticism & consciousness, yoga, & A LOT of old Theosophical books. Most are probably Italian but there's also English, German, & French. I love reading his annotations & notes inside.

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Jennifer Ashby @jenniferashby.bsky.social · 15d

Artist Mina Loy was a friend & their children would play together there. Looking at the pics I can see why Loy felt so out of place visiting Florentine villadom in her (unpublished) autobios. Beautiful but absolutely, horrifyingly gratuitous wealth held be some.

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Jennifer Ashby @jenniferashby.bsky.social · 15d

Villa Braggiotti, prev. home to American musicians (& enthusiasts of vegetarianism & the Bhagavadgītā) Lily & Isadore Braggiotti in the early 20th C, is for sale for €12,000,000.

www.italy-sothebysrealty.com/it/vendita/i...

Elegante villa del XIV° secolo con parco di un ettaro

Sito ufficiale - Italy Sotheby’s International Realty. Comprare, vendere o affittare ville, castelli, appartamenti e case di lusso in Italia: scopri Sotheby's International Realty e scegli l'immobile ...

www.italy-sothebysrealty.com

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Reposted by Jennifer Ashby

CSMBR Pisa @csmbr-pisa.bsky.social · 21d

Forthcoming this Autumn with the
CSMBR ONLINE LECTURE SERIES

#CSMBR #Lecture #astromedicine

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Jennifer Ashby @jenniferashby.bsky.social · 22d

Ah, that's interesting - what drew you to Assagioli? It's a bit of an underrated gem. I think a lot of his collection was lost during fascist persecution but there's an array of his books still (which he often annotated) & then there's the archive on site. I live close by so I often like to go.

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Jennifer Ashby @jenniferashby.bsky.social · 22d

The bees of @eui-eu.bsky.social in Villa Salviati, Florence (@eui-history.bsky.social)

Beekeeper inspecting a hive in Tuscany, Italy.

Beekeeper with a bee hive on a tuscan hilltop. Honeycomb is visible as well as larvae and lots of bees. European University Institute, Florence, Italy.

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Jennifer Ashby @jenniferashby.bsky.social · 23d

This #ModWrite I am writing about the founder of Psychosynthesis, Roberto Assagioli (1888-1974), in his personal library in Florence

A small red rose bush on a table in front of a book case. Institute of Psychosynthesis, Florence, Italy.

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Reposted by Jennifer Ashby

British Association for Modernist Studies (BAMS) @modernistudies.bsky.social · 29d

We’re excited to share #TheModernistReview57, our first autumn issue! It includes seven reviews on diverse topics in modernist studies. Go check it out! we hope you enjoy reading:
modernistreviewcouk.wordpress.com/2025/09/09/t...

The Modernist Review Issue #57

8th September 2025 All the months are crude experiments out of which the perfect September is made. (Virginia Woolf, ‘The Lands End’, 1905) September arrives again, and with the beginning of autumn…

modernistreviewcouk.wordpress.com

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Jennifer Ashby @jenniferashby.bsky.social · Sep 7

Buzzi purchased the site, deep in the woods, in 1956. It included a Franciscan convent, built in 1282, which legend has it is located where St. Francis stopped in the night, using the marsh plant "scarza" to shelter.

The Franciscan Convent of Scarzuola was founded by Saint Francis of Assisi in 1218. It is said that the saint used a marsh plant, the scarza, to build a hut. The church " Sancte Marie loci fratrum minorum de Scarciola" was built on the same site.

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Jennifer Ashby @jenniferashby.bsky.social · Sep 7

Buzzi purchased the site, deep in the woods, in 1956. It included a Franciscan convent, built in 1282, which legend has it is located where St. Francis stopped in the night, using the marsh plant "scarza" to shelter.

Reposted by Jennifer Ashby

Jennifer Ashby @jenniferashby.bsky.social · Sep 6

Pilgrimage to Tomaso Buzzi's fantastical "ideal city" of theatres, La Scarzuola - hidden in the hills of Umbria down an unpaved road

A twentieth century architectural work by T. BUZZI. An alchemical sun, the partner of a moon, stands in an amphitheatre with a tilted stage and a complex of architectural references to major works such as the Colosseum and the Pyramids. The Umbrian countryside is visible behind, with high rolling hills and woods.

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Jennifer Ashby @jenniferashby.bsky.social · Sep 7

Pulsate et aperietur vobis

A symbolic portal with a winged hourglass referencing alchemy, eye and wing and hand motifs, and a spiral clock.

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Jennifer Ashby @jenniferashby.bsky.social · Sep 7

Some more details

La Scarzuola, Italy. A lily pond below arches and an architectural experiment.

A golden coloured symbol of a shooting star with wings and eyes

A circular theatre with a thunderstruck cypress and stars.

A modernist feminine torso with two alchemical portals covered with gold coloured embellishments

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Jennifer Ashby @jenniferashby.bsky.social · Sep 6

Pilgrimage to Tomaso Buzzi's fantastical "ideal city" of theatres, La Scarzuola - hidden in the hills of Umbria down an unpaved road

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Jennifer Ashby @jenniferashby.bsky.social · Sep 4

Umbrian road trip begins in Perugia

Sunset over Perugia, Umbria in Italy. The clouds are red and purple and a moon rises above the borgo in blue skies.

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Reposted by Jennifer Ashby

Jennifer Ashby @jenniferashby.bsky.social · Aug 30

Some solid advice on how to appreciate modern art from the Chicago Record Herald of 1913: "HOW TO APPRECIATE IT - Eat three welsh rarebits, smoke two pipefuls of "hop" and sniff cocaine until every street car looks like a goldfish and the Masonic Temple resembles a tiny white mouse."

Quotation from the Chicago Record Herald from March 1913 in which they advise people on how to appreciate modern (Cubist, Futurist, Post-Impressionist) art in response to the Armory Show. They mockingly suggest: 'HOW TO APPRECIATE IT - Eat three welsh rarebits, smoke two pipefuls of "hop" and sniff cocaine until every street car looks like a goldfish and the Masonic Temple resembles a tiny white mouse.'

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Jennifer Ashby @jenniferashby.bsky.social · Aug 30

Some solid advice on how to appreciate modern art from the Chicago Record Herald of 1913: "HOW TO APPRECIATE IT - Eat three welsh rarebits, smoke two pipefuls of "hop" and sniff cocaine until every street car looks like a goldfish and the Masonic Temple resembles a tiny white mouse."

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Jennifer Ashby @jenniferashby.bsky.social · Aug 25

The most beautiful greenhouse that I have ever seen is this one in Florence, Italy - look at the details above the doors! Made predominantly of glass and iron, and overseen by architect and engineer Giacomo Roster, it was completed in 1880.

An illuminated large nineteenth century greenhouse glowing in the night. Florence, Italy. Late nineteenth century design for a greenhouse (or glasshouse).

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