This exhibition is dedicated to the founder of the Villa Giulia Museum, Felice Barnabei, a leading figure in the General Directorate of Museums and Antiquity Excavations (1875-1900), Deputy in the Chamber of the Kingdom of Italy from 1899 to 1917 ( XX - XXIV Legislature) for the Colleges of Teramo and Atri, State Councilor since 1907, Honorary Section President of the State Council since 14 January 1917.

It is part of the celebrations for the first centenary of his death (October 29, 1922), launched by the Villa Giulia Museum with the exhibition “Felice Barnabei. Drops of private memories” (9 September - 10 October 2021), focused on a significant nucleus of materials received as a gift from some of his generous descendants. The anniversary of the centenary is an opportunity to honor and enhance the person who has linked his name and his intelligent and energetic action to the Museum of Villa Giulia, whose foundation in 1889 as an extra-urban section of the Roman National Museum is placed in the fervent and contrasted climate of post-unification Italy, in which the methodological and legislative foundations of National Archeology were laid.

Thanks also to the substantial contribution of many family memories (photos, documents, letters, business cards, objects) preserved by his direct and indirect descendants and donated or otherwise made available, this exhibition is a story of the articulated private and institutional story of Felice Barnabei, full of successes but also of bitterness and in which the personal story of a man out of the ordinary intertwines and in some ways determines History with a capital "S".