Exhibition
Giorgio de Chirico
22.11.1975 — 07.01.1976
Show introduction
Giorgio de Chirico's anthology, inaugurated on November 22, 1975 at Galleria dello Scudo, is the first set up in Italy since the "Pictor optimus" entered the French Academy as the first foreign associate.
The works chosen for the exhibition cover a wide time span documenting the different themes, starting with that of metaphysics, which for over half a century has been recognized as one of the most original expressions of 20th century art. Its source is in the allegorical romanticism of the Germanic area between Boecklin and Feuerbach, fueled by the philosophical thought of Nietzsche and by the vision of the painters he studied in Munich in the years of his youth.
To the “Manichini” (Mannequins) of the '10s and' 20s, including Il Vaticinatore (The Daydreamer) of 1919, Il filosofo (The philosopher) or Les jeux terribles of 1925 after the first passage from Paul Guillaume entered the Chrysler jr. Collection, or Gli archeologi (The Archaeologists) of 1928 -, are flanked by compositions such as Natura morta antica (Ancient Still Life) of 1926 already in the Léonce Rosenberg collection, subjects such as the Bagni misteriosi (Mysterious Baths) of 1935, documented here in a rare large painting, to reach the stage in which the artist arrives at a personal reinterpretation of "secentism" that from Rubens arrives to Delacroix, recreating the splendor of ancient art through a wise pictorial ability.
Artist
Giorgio de Chirico was born in Volos, the capital of Thessaly, in 1888. His parents were Evaristo de Chirico, an railway engineer and descendent of a Sicilian family that had moved to Tuscany, and Gemma Cervetto, a Genoese noblewoman. After the death of his father, in 1906 the de Chirico family moved to Munich. Giorgio de Chirico began to study at the fine arts academy and also closely studied the work by Böcklin and Klinger, above all, in the museums. He became interested in philosophy and studied Nietzsche, Schopenhauer, and Weininger. It was in this period that he painted his first works inspired by Böcklin.
