Giorgio Morandi

Giorgio Morandi, born in Bologna on July 20, 1890, to Andrea Morandi and Maria Maccaferri, was one of Italy's greatest 20th-century painters and engravers, renowned for his essential **still lifes** and landscapes defined by the poetics of 'Morandism'. The eldest of five children in a petty bourgeois Bolognese family, he showed an early passion for drawing, enrolling in 1907 at the Accademia di Belle Arti in Bologna, where he graduated in 1913 alongside peers like Osvaldo Licini, Severo Pozzati, and Mario Bacchelli. His father's death in 1909 made him head of the family, moving to via Fondazza 36, where he lived with his mother and sisters for most of his life, painting in his room and spending summers in Grizzana, a key inspiration for many landscapes.

Initially influenced by Cézanne, Picasso, and Renaissance masters like Giotto and Piero della Francesca, Morandi explored diverse styles: a brief flirt with Futurism in 1914 and Metaphysics in 1918 with De Chirico and Carrà, leading to a mature, autonomous, intimate, and metaphysical language. From 1930 to 1956, he taught 'etching techniques' at Bologna's Accademia, appointed 'for clear fame' without competition, and exhibited at Venice Biennials from 1928, showing paintings and etchings. Key shows include the 1935 Rome Quadriennale, the 1941 Cortina Collectors' Exhibition prize, and personal exhibitions up to 1963 at Geneva's Galerie Krugier.

During World War II, evacuated to Grizzana from 1943, he created intense landscapes foreshadowing his final works. In 1963, he received Bologna's Archiginnasio d'oro. He died on June 18, 1964, in Bologna, after signing his last canvas in February, leaving a legacy of over 1000 oils, 1300 etchings, and works embodying silence, solitude, and essentiality, influencing generations. Bologna's Museo Morandi preserves his studio, emblem of his solitary, art-dedicated life.