Raoul Viviani Landscape with Figures Italy XX Century - The Country Road

Caricatures of Gandusio and Melato

Tempera on paper. Signed at top right. Luigi Daniele Crespi was a painter, journalist and illustrator active in Rome from 1912 to 1940, of whom no other biographical information is available. Linked to the Futurist movement, he was also active in advertising posters and set design. His elegant caricatures and satirical drawings were published in many magazines and covers. In this drawing Crespi offers caricatures of two well-known show business personalities of the time, Antonio Gandusio (1875 - 1951), who was one of the most interesting Italian comic actors, both film and theatre, almost a commedia dell'arte mask, and Maria Melato (1885 - 1950), a theatre, radio and cinema actress. Framed.

In Brianza

Oil painting on canvas. At the bottom left there is the DB monogram. Title and gallery stamp on the back. The glimpse of the Brianza countryside, still flat, sees a shepherd who lets his cows graze in the meadows immediately outside the village, near the dirt road flanked by light poles; two bare and thin trunks stand vertically, almost parallel, dividing the scene into three shots. The work is presented in a coeval frame.

Oil on canvas. Signed lower right. On the back there is a label of participation in the 1960 exhibition of contemporary Italian painting in Milan, organized by the Society for Fine Arts and Permanent Exhibition of Milan. It is a broad glimpse of the city of Venice, taken from one of the islands in front of it, of which some boats moored at the pier can be seen; the scene is horizontally divided quite clearly into two parts, from the central sky line of the city: above the sky, shaded in blue-grey tones, below the sea, with shades instead veering towards green. The atmosphere is clear, of absolute stillness, of immobility. Ezio Pastorio, originally from Cremona but transplanted to Valseriana after his studies, is considered "a great Italian master of the 20th century, who knew how to renew the artistic language of the landscape while maintaining a strong link with 19th century painting". His production is post-impressionist in nature, especially in the large landscape production that depicts the Po and Bergamo plains, the Venetian lagoon and some Parisian glimpses, admired during some travels. In his works, Pastorio creates suggestive atmospheres using infinite ranges of colours, which harmonize and sometimes even contrast, but always presented as a transparency which annuls the static nature of the representation and with a delicacy which expresses his devout religiosity towards nature and the created. The work, coming from a private collection, is presented in a frame.

Ligurian Beach

Oil on canvas. Signed lower left. It is a glimpse of the Ligurian Riviera, near a cove, surmounted by houses close to the coast. Berto Ferrari, born and always lived in Liguria, was a skilled and sensitive marine and landscape painter of the post-impressionist tradition, who painted the beauties of the Ligurian Riviera and numerous views of the Apennine hinterland. The painting has drops of color and traces of restoration. It is in a coeval frame.

Flowers in Vase

Oil on wooden hardboard. Signed lower right. The floral composition presented here is an infrequent subject in the production of the Palermitan painter Aurelio Catti, best known for the urban views and landscapes of the Italian and European cities he visited. However, the work is stylistically part of that post-impressionist repertoire which was adopted by numerous Italian artists in the first half of the 1900s. The work is presented in a frame.

The garden of the house of Camerano Casasco

Watercolor and ink on paper. Signed and dated September 14, 1952 in the lower left corner; location at the bottom right. On the back this title of the work of the famous Russian set designer, painter and draftsman, who since 1935 was the main scenographer of the Teatro Alla Scala in Milan. In an exposed frame.

Mixed media (pencil and watercolor) on paper. Signed at the bottom. On one of them there is also the date (1946 and 1947). It is a small collection of sketches on paper, six faces of children and women and four landscapes, still with pencil strokes and incomplete watercolor paints, in the typical ranges of Mantovani, those clear and transparent colors that are considered one of its characteristic features. Lugi Mantovani, Milanese by birth and training, established himself in the artistic panorama and became an active part in the Milanese cultural cenacles of the city, to which he dedicated his production, consisting mainly of landscapes and city views. The paintings, of different sizes, are presented in style frames, with small lacks (one missing the glass).

Oil painting on canvas. 1930s ca. The woman depicted wears an overcoat which in its style recalls the military clothing of the fascist period, to which the painting dates back. Even the pose of the woman seems to be military, proud and erect, with a stern gaze that understands her role. The work is presented in a gilded frame from the early 1900s.

Portrait of a child

Oil on canvas. Signed lower right. Palermitan painter, Francesco Camarda distinguished himself for figure painting, dedicated to portraits and the nude, and above all for animalist painting, in the wake of the realist production of the Palizzi brothers. He was able to express a painting with a lively and fresh color. In this small canvas is proposed the portrait of a child sitting on a chair, hooded to frame the plump and smiling face, the direct gaze, the plump little hands resting on the knees in a proud and resolute pose. The work is presented in a contemporary frame.

Les Bouches de Naples gemissent de Terreur ou de Plaisir 1969

Ink on paper. Signature, date and title below. Accompanied by authentication on photo from Galleria Giò Marconi in Milan and stamp from private archive. It is the drawing of the young artist who soon became one of the most important exponents of world surrealism, who was a poet and painter, but also a filmmaker, art and film critic, photographer and humorous designer. Born in the north of France, in 1927 he settled in Paris, where he came into contact with a group of young poets and philosophers, with whom he founded the '' Grand Jeu '' movement: play is understood as an art of living. Since 1928 he has collaborated with texts, poems and drawings for the movement's magazine and in the meantime he collaborates as an editor and reporter with various Parisian newspapers.In 1932, having exhausted the experience of the `` Grand Jeu '', he passes to the surrealist movement, collaborating on its publications and participating in its exhibitions. His humor turns towards the unusual and cruelty, more and more derisive of the absurdity of everyday life, of the tragic side of common existence, to which the spirit and the unconscious rebel, trying to access the unobservable. Knows Salvador Dalí. In 1939 he also began his activity as a filmmaker. In 1941 his first personal exhibition took place in Paris: the first buyer was Pablo Picasso. Participate in all surrealist exhibitions, including the 1947 international one in Paris. In 1951, for reasons relating to the internal discipline of the group, he abandoned the surrealist movement with others, while continuing to practice its poetics. In 1955 he also became passionate about photography. Since 1968 he has devoted himself almost exclusively to painting, abandoning the activity of humorous draftsman. In the same year he settled permanently in Milan: in Italy he exhibited in various personal exhibitions, those in Milan at the Galleria Marconi. The work presented here, an early drawing, comes from an important Milanese private collection. It is presented in a frame.

Venetian glimpse

Oil on canvas. Signed lower right. Painter, sculptor and ceramist, the Turin artist Giovanni Riva participated in numerous national reviews and exhibitions, including the Venice Biennale in 1940 and 1942. Among his production as a ceramist, the faces of many Lenci dolls are particularly remembered. In painting he devoted himself above all to glimpses of Turin, Milan and Venice, rendered with great spontaneity and immediacy, as well as genre scenes. The systematic study of ancient art, the adherence to the Renaissance ideals of the sculpture of Donatello, Michelangelo and Giambologna pushed Giovanni Riva towards the adoption of an expressive code similar to the taste of the romantic nineteenth century, rather than to futurist dynamism or surrealist visions . The Venetian glimpse proposed here is presented in a style frame.

Male face

Oil on canvas. Signed lower right. The Milanese artist Carlo Jacono was an illustrator and painter: his unmistakable style, the mastery in the execution, the prolificacy and artistic ability in over 50 years of career, the knowing how to lend himself to different genres and the great success at readers and publishers made him one of the masters of Italian illustration and one of the most appreciated and well-known names on the national and international illustration scene. He was also known as the "Man of the circle", a pseudonym due to the layout of many of his covers in pink, police, science fiction, Italian, English, Swedish, Norwegian, American (we recall, among many, the covers of the series "Il giallo Mondadori "), or more simply with the surname only, Jacono, with which he signed himself. Starting from 1970 Jacono also embarked on a career as a painter, exhibiting in personal exhibitions both in Italy and abroad, preferring a figurative vein with a romantic connotation that finds its masterpiece in the series of "The warriors". They said of this production: "they are apparitions of warriors of other times, which the imagination comes to realize even in the minute features of the face, and to imagine in the most reckless actions". Probably the painting presented here is also part of this series: it is the face of a Nordic warrior, as can be deduced from the fur headdress that frames the proud and concentrated face in which the cold blue eyes stand out, and from the burnished metal collar engraved with signs graphics that refer to the Nordic runes; half-length, the shoulder straps of the armor can be seen. The painting is presented in a frame.