Introduction

Alain Messaoudi is assistant professor in Modern History at the University of Nantes, attached to the Centre de recherches en histoire internationale et atlantique (CRHIA – Centre for Research in International and Atlantic History). His research focuses on the history of Orientalism in the field of Arabic studies (Les arabisants et la France coloniale (1780-1930). Savants, interprètes, médiateurs, Lyon, ENS Éditions, 2015) and on the modalities of the European perception of Islam in the 19th and 20th centuries. He is currently conducting a research on the development of fine arts in North Africa, especially in Tunisia, since the nineteenth century.

Camilla Murgia studied art history at the University of Neuchâtel (Switzerland). She then obtained a PhD in art history at Oxford University (Pierre-Marie Gault de Saint-Germain: Artistic Models and Criticism in Early Nineteenth-Century France, Saarbrücken, VDM Verlag, 2009). Camilla was a Junior Research Fellow in Art History at Oxford University (St John's College) and subsequently taught at the universities of Neuchâtel and Geneva. She is interested in the visual and material culture of the long nineteenth century, print culture and the relationship between fine arts and theatre, particularly in France.