The 1574 edition of Cortese's Secreti was featured in Penn's 'Defying Convention: Frontiers of Knowledge' exhibition on women in early science.
By the late 2010s, Isabella Cortese's book gained renewed public visibility through academic exhibitions. The University of Pennsylvania's 'Defying Convention: Frontiers of Knowledge' exhibition featured the 1574 edition of I secreti, drawn from the university's E. F. Smith Collection of historical scientific texts.
The exhibition situated Cortese's work within a broader narrative celebrating women who pushed against the conventions of their time to participate in and contribute to scientific and intellectual life. By displaying an original printed copy of Cortese's book alongside works by other historically significant women, the exhibition underscored her rare and important position as an ostensibly female-authored voice in the alchemical and scientific literature of the Renaissance.
Such exhibitions serve an important public and educational function: they make specialized bibliographic and archival knowledge accessible to broader audiences, including students, researchers, and the general public, and they actively construct historical memory around figures like Cortese whose biographical details remain elusive.
The inclusion of Cortese's 1574 edition in this exhibition reflects ongoing academic and cultural interest in recovering and showcasing the contributions—real or symbolic—of women to the history of science, alchemy, and print culture.