CACrown ArchivesThe cinema collection
Menu
Research dossier · Arts & Letters

Helmet of Fieramosca

2011 sculpture in Capua, Italy

Manuscripts, fine bindings, an engraving plate and preserved performance ephemera
Arts and lettersInterpretive dossier study · Crown Archives visual atlas
Record originEnglish Wikipedia
Text licenseCC BY-SA 4.0
Source revisionMay 19, 2026
Entity authorityQ28457988 ↗
Source-derived summary

Helmet of Fieramosca (it:l’Elmo di Fieramosca) is the monumental work in bronze created by the sculptor and painter Arturo Casanova for the city of Capua and installed in Piazza Umberto I.

The work is a massive helmet made of bronze and steel, notable for its striking 16° tilt relative to its base. It is composed of approximately 150 welded bronze plates and measures 9 meters in height, 6 meters in diameter, and weighs around 15 tons.

Before its installation in Capua, the helmet was exhibited at the 54th Venice Biennale in 2011, as part of the Italy Pavilion (Padiglione Italia), curated by Vittorio Sgarbi.

History

Designed by the artist as a great functional sculpture, the monumental work is opened, therefore, the architecture used to be inhabited and lived. Not a protective helmet so, but the helmet that becomes a "home thinking". The largest facility dedicated to the leader capuano Ettore Fieramosca has a height of nine meters, a diameter of six and a weight of 15 tons and will be the place of reception, a physical and virtual space of the city of Capua, a window on the world, but especially local icon. The helmet itself as a kind of urban-scale structure, the only example in Italy, whose artistic value is combined with the info-point function for tourists and usable inside. But Fieramosca Infopoint Monument is also and above all a monumental work in a new context, which is the architectural and urban Cosmo16, a multipurpose space to serve the city and the traveler. In this urban space helmet it stands as a thoughtful sentinel to defend the territory. Piazza Umberto I becomes an area of services capable of hosting a multi-storey car park which offers, for its strategic position and the geometry of space, to serve as a support of the complex knot of collective public activities, trade and services included in the walls of the nearby historic town.

Editorial summary

Begin with the source’s own compact description: “Helmet of Fieramosca” is 2011 sculpture in Capua, Italy. The dossier treats that line as a proposition to test through Helmet, Fieramosca and sculpture, not as a finished interpretation.

Editorial reviewA productive route into publication, performance and collection histories when the underlying object or edition remains clearly identified. The current lead gives the account dated anchors—2011—that can be checked directly. The selected authority fields contribute no independent date. For this dossier, Helmet, Fieramosca and sculpture is the immediate research focus.
Editorial analysis

Why this record matters

The phrase “2011 sculpture in Capua, Italy” supplies a clear boundary for inquiry. It also exposes the unanswered questions: who defined that boundary, when it became stable and which sources sit outside it.

Evidence profile

Object files, edition statements, performance records and contemporary criticism preserve different stages of the work’s history. The source revision retrieved here is dated May 19, 2026. The linked authority identifier is Q28457988. None of the 0 selected statements returned an explicit reference. The first chronological checks are 2011.

Critical limits

Later fame can flatten the distinction between original context, subsequent adaptation and institutional collecting history. The source lead contains qualifying language; that uncertainty should survive quotation, summary and reuse. Authority statements aid reconciliation but still require their own references, qualifiers and ranks to be checked.

How to read it

Separate the work, its editions or performances, and its later reception. Catalogue records, publication histories and object files often preserve different parts of that story.

Best used for
  • Identifying works and editions
  • Tracing reception history
  • Finding collection records
Verify next

The original object or edition, catalogue raisonné, performance record, rights file and holding institution.

Three-step research path

  1. Establish the record: confirm the title “Helmet of Fieramosca”, its source revision and the description used here.
  2. Expand the search: follow Helmet of Fieramosca primary sources, Helmet of Fieramosca archive and Helmet research across catalogues and specialist indexes.
  3. Test the account: compare the strongest cited source with the responsible institution’s current record and note any disagreement.

Questions for further research

  1. Which source most directly establishes the central claim about “Helmet of Fieramosca”?
  2. Where is authorship, date or provenance documented?
  3. Which edition, object, performance or recording is being described?
Subject index

Search terms from this dossier

Source & attribution

This entry incorporates text from “Helmet of Fieramosca” on English Wikipedia. Contributors are listed in the page history. Text is available under the Creative Commons Attribution-ShareAlike 4.0 License. Selected authority identifiers and statements are retrieved from Wikidata under CC0; their references and qualifiers remain part of the verification path.