Tag: italy

Fabio Novembre

Fabio Novembre, The S.O.S. Chair, 2003, Fiberglass, Polyurethane

Fabio Novembre was born in Milan in 1966. An architect since 1992, he became famous through a large series of design projects for restaurants, nightclubs and shops in Italy and abroad, as well as through his unique pieces of Italian furniture designed for Cappellini, Driade and Flaminia.

Novembre proposes works that highlight curvaceous forms and elegant and innovative lines. He often emphasizes sex within his creations. He stands on the boarders of provocation and poetry, contemporary art and design with his pieces.

The S.O.S. line is a joinable system of armchairs and chaise longue realized in a cubic form with a structure in lacquered matt black fiberglass. The sitting area is covered with a bielastic stitch spread in polyurethane and PVC, in a golden color.

Imperatore Constantino

Artist Unknown, Imperatore Constantino, Musei Capitolini, Rome, italy

The colossal statue of Constantine I,  sculpted in marble, was one of the most important works of late-ancient Roman sculpture The remaining segments are at the Palazzo dei Conservatori in Rome and were dated between 313 and 324. A hand and the right arm, the two feet, the knee and the right femur, the left calf and the head are the only remaining parts of the statue. The origin statue judging from the remains was a seated form that reached approximately 12 meters in height.

The head, which was originally decorated with a metallic crown, is grandiose and solemn, presenting the characteristics of Roman art of that era, with the stylization and simplification tendencies of the lines.  The face is squared, with hair and eyebrows rendered with very refined and “calligraphic” marble engravings, but still completely unnatural looking. The eyes are big, almost huge, with the well-marked pupil looking upwards; they are the focal point of the whole portrait.

The Emperor’s gaze seems to scrutinize the surrounding environment and gives the portrait an appearance of extraterrestrial austerity. The hair is treated as a single swollen mass deeply furrowed by the streaks that separate some locks. The face posesses an aquiling nose, long, thin lips and a prominent chin. This is an idelaized face, despite the classical importation, which seeks to show an aura of holiness.

Andrea Mantegna

Andrea Mantegna, “Saint Sebastian”, 1456-1459, Oil on Panel, Kunsthistorisches Museum

Saint Sebastian was the subject of three paintings by the Italian Early Renaissance master Andrea Mantegna. The Paduan artist lived in a period of frequent plagues; Saint Sebastian was considered protector against the plague as having been shot through by arrows.

According to Battisti, the theme refers to the Book of Revelation. A rider is present in the clouds at the upper left corner. As specified in John’s work, the cloud is white and the rider has a scythe which he is using to cut the cloud. The rider has been interpreted as Saturn, the Roman-Greek god.

Instead of the classical figure of Sebastian tied to a pole in the Rome’s Martial Field, Andrea Mantegna portrayed the saint against an arch, whether a triumphal arch or the gate of the city. Characteristic of Mantegna is the clarity of the surface, the precision of an “archaeological” reproduction of the architectonical details, and the elegance of the martyr’s posture. The vertical inscription at the right side of the saint is the signature of Mantegna in Greek.

Carlo Crivelli

Carlo Crivelli, “Saint Stephen”, 1476, Tempera and Gilding on Panel, national Gallery, London

Carlo Crivelli painted in tempera only, despite the increasing popularity of oil painting during his lifetime, and on panels, though some of his paintings have since been transfered to canvas. His predilection for decoratively punched gilded backgrounds is one of the marks of this conservative taste, in part imposed by his patrons. Of his early polyptychs, only one, the altarpiece from Ascoli Piceno, survives in its entirety in its original frame. All the others have been disassembled and their panels and predella scenes are divided among several museums.

This panel showing Saint Stephen is part of the large “Demidoff Altarpiece” made for the high altar of San Domenico in Ascoli Piceno, east-central Italy.

Saint Stephen was the first Christian martyr. He was a lay assistant to the priest of the first Christian community in 1st-century Palestine and was responsible for a daily distribution of food to the poor. Accused of blasphemy against Moses and God, he was tried by a religious council. As he spoke in defence of his belief in Christ as the Messiah, those watching him saw the face of an angel. Enraged, the council stopped the trial and took him out of the city where he was stoned to death.

Leonardo Lanzolla

Leonardo Lanzolla, “Visionary Influences to Believe”, Date Unknown, Mixed Media on Board, 12 x 16 Inches

From Torino, Italy, Leonardo Lanzolla was born in Torino, Italy, in 1958. He is a self-taught artist, influenced by Miro, Cobra avant-garde, art brut, folk art, Dubuffet, Basquiat, urban graffiti and cave paintings. His practice is very direct and unpretentious, displaying keenness for experimentation.

Leonardo Lanzolla studied in Torino and moved in 1986 to Seattle where he now lives and makes art. His timeless, colorful and original works are in private collections around the globe and have been featured in notable exhibits in France and Sweden.

Emilio Greco

Emilio Greco, Title Unknown, Date Unknown, Ink Drawing Detail, The Estorick Collection of Modern Italian Art, London

Strongly influenced by Etruscan, Greek and Roman art, Emilio Greco is best known for his powerful portrait busts and sensual nudes, often characterised by perfectly rounded heads. However, while such subjects dominate his collected works, Greco also received important religious commissions during his career. One of the artist’s first major works was his 1953 “Monument to Pinocchio”, the base of which differed markedly from Greco’s subsequent figurative style in its abstract, spiralling forms.

Having been awarded prizes at both the 1952 Rome Quadriennale and the 1956 Venice Biennale, Greco began to work on a set of monumental bronze doors for Orvieto Cathedral in 1962. He was initially unenthusiastic about the commission as the proposed themes left him uninspired, but his attitude altered dramatically once the subject matter was changed.

“When, finally, the Corporal Works of Mercy – those capital commands of human behaviour – were suggested to me, I accepted immediately because I felt strongly that this theme was congenial to my beliefs. It is an eternal theme, perpetually occurring, not only an historical one; a human theme, not only one connected with the Church.”- Emilio Greco

Completed in 1964, Greco’s doors reveal debts to Renaissance masters such as Donatello in their subtle bas-relief modelling. However, they also exhibit more modern tendencies, as in the two lateral doors depicting angels in flight set against a geometric-abstract background. The following year, Greco was commissioned to create a monument to John XXIII for St Peter’s in Rome, representing the Pope visiting the city’s Regina Coeli prison.

Greco’s drawing style is extremely sculptural in its evocation of volume, and its concern with defining the spaces and relationships between forms. Conversely, the surfaces of Greco’s sculptural heads are often scored with lines recalling the cross-hatching characteristic of his vigorous yet elegant ink drawings.

Parmigianino

Parmigianino, “Portrait of Pier Maria Rossi di San Secondo”, Museo de Prado, Madrid, Spain

Girolamo Francesco Maria Mazzola, also known as Parmigianino was an Italian Mannerist painter and printmaker active in Florence, Rome, Bologna, and his native city of Parma. His work is characterized by a “refined sensuality” and often elongation of forms and includes the 1527 “Vision of Saint Jerome” and the iconic  the 1534 “Madonna with the Long Neck”. He remains the best known artist of the first generation whose whole careers fall into the Mannerist period.

He produced outstanding drawings, and was one of the first Italian painters to experiment with printmaking himself. While his portable works have always been keenly collected and are now in major museums in Italy and around the world, his two large projects in fresco are in a church in Parma and a palace in a small town nearby. He painted a number of important portraits, leading a trend in Italy towards the three-quarters or full-length figure, previously mostly reserved for royalty.

His prodigious and individual talent has always been recognised, but his career was disrupted by war, especially the Sack of Rome in 1527, three years after he moved there, and then ended by his death at only 37.

Enrico Baj

Enrico Baj, “Al Fuoco, Al Fuoco (Fire! Fire!)”, 1963–64, Oil Paint and Meccano on Furnishing Fabric, Tate Museum

Enrico Baj had painted many humorously satirical pictures of what are sometimes known as ‘decorated people’, a favourite theme being high-ranking army officers bedecked with sashes and medals who are gesticulating some command. There are about half-a-dozen other pictures of the period between 1963-64 with very similar figures : single figures as well as a row of figures. Enrico Baj pointed out in an October 1974 letter that in this painting, as in many others of the same period, he used spare pieces of English ‘Meccano’ erector sets. During this same period he built thirteen sculptures using Meccano pieces.

This picture has a label of the 1964 Venice Biennale on the back with the title ‘Mani in Alto’ (Hands Up); but it does not appear among the works by Baj listed in the Biennale catalogue. The reason for this was that it was added at the last moment after some other works by Baj were censured by the Italian curators of the Biennale for being irreverent towards the Italian authorities and army. Enrico Baj stated that the title was changed when the painting was modified in 1964; the two dates 1963 (which is inscribed on the stretcher) and 1964 can therefore be used together.

Antonio Canova

Antonio Canova, “The Sleeping Endymion”, 1822, Plaster Model for the Completed Marble Sculpture

In May 1819, the 6th Duke of Devonshire, on his first trip to Rome, paid a visit to the studio of the most celebrated sculptor of the time, Antonio Canova. He marvelled at what he saw and commissioned a marble statue from Canova, leaving both its size and subject to the sculptor to decide, and paying a deposit in advance.

The marble was roughed out by 1822, when Canova asked for a further £1,500. It was completed before his death later that year. It arrived in London the following year and caused a stir when first displayed at Devonshire House. The 6th Duke, who regarded it as his greatest sculptural treasure, also commissioned a large bronze copy of it from the sculptor Francis Chantrey.

The finished marble “The Sleeping Endymion and His Dog” is located in the Sculpture Gallery of Chatsworth House in Derbyshire, England.

Source: hadrian6

Paolo Pettigiani

The Dolomites: Infra-Red Photography by Paolo Pettigiani

Italian artist Paolo Pettigiani has been experimaenting in photography since age eleven. In the last few years he has produced several series of eye-popping infrared images. Pettigiani’s most recent work showcases the Dolomites, a craggy mountain range in the northeastern region of his native Italy.

Infrared photography uses a special film or light sensor that processes the usually not-visible wavelengths of infrared light (specifically near-infrared, as opposed to far-infrared, which is used in thermal imaging.) The resulting images from Pettigiani depict the stands of coniferous trees as watermelon-pink, while surfaces that don’t reflect IR light stay more true to their nature hues.

Dario Wolf

Dario Wolf, “Gli Amici, (The Friends)”, 1924, Copper Etching, 16.7 x 13 cm, Private Collection

Dario Wolf was born in Trento, Italy on December 3, 1901. He completed high school in Rome with honors in the art of composition and painting of the nude. He studied at the Academy of Fine Arts under the guidance of Sigismund Lipinskj. In 1924, still a student, Wolf won the Calderon prize for his entered drawing of a nude.

He started his career as an engraver in 1921 with the wood engraving “Furor Animae” and established himself as an etcher with the plates “Powerful-Powerless”, “Superstition” and “Destiny”. He was a member of the Group of Engravers and Roman Artists, composed of twenty-five Italian and foreign artists.

Dario Wolf devoted himself to the process of etching on metal and the technique of aquatint, producing “The Accordion Player”, on a large zinc plate in 1957. He was one of the very few who devoted themselves to engraving in steel technology, the “black style” as attested by his important 1963 engravings:: his “Ethiopian” in 1966,  and his “Vicolo dei Birri” in 1968.

“Etching is an art that can benefit more than any other to express moods fleeting, to realize the innermost thoughts and most complex, to express the life of things real and unreal atmosphere that goes from deep velvety shadows stretched to wrap lights enchanted ”- Dario Wolf

Vincenzo Camuccini

Vincenzo Camuccini, “The Assassination of Julius Caesar”, 1804-05, Oil on Canvas, 44 x 77 Inches, Galleria Nazionale d’Arte Moderna e Contemporánea, Rome, Italy

Considered the leading academic artist of his time, Italian Neoclassic painter Vincenzo Camuccini, born in 1771, created lavish portraits, and historical and religious scenes. Until nearly age 30, Camuccini spent his career imitating the Masters, particularly Raphael. “Death of Julius Caesar” was his first major independent work that incorporated his own style, and his only work aside from his self-portrait that has been widely reproduced. Camuccini was commissioned to create a mosaic for the Vatican and became so popular, he received numerous honors from the Pope, Italian courts and several academies.

The portrayal of Caesar is based upon a bust of the emperor, and is considered to be extremely accurate. The painting lavishly illustrates Caesar’s assassination during a Senate meeting in the Theatre of Pompey on the Ides of March, which a seer had warned him against attending. The Senate killed Caesar because they were threatened by his increasing power. In this painting, he may be gesturing in shock at his friend Brutus, who had also turned against him.