The article provides an outline of the research project on the Galleria degli autoritratti which seeks to reconstruct the relevant practices associated with the establishment, the organisation and the public display of this collection of paintings, considering the fact that the Galleria is a special case in that it focuses on just one particular genre. The period being examined stretches from the collection’s establishment and systematisation by Leopoldo and Cosimo III to the completion of its transformation into a well-published, state-run collection accessible to the general public towards the end of the 18th century. It is further assumed that the existing evidence will make it possible to indirectly reconstruct the conditions under which the artists were producing their works
