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Virgilio Guidi (April 4, 1891 – January 7, 1984) was an Italian artist and writer. He was born in Rome into an artistic family. His father was a sculptor.Cowling & Mundy 1990, p. 124. Guidi received his early training at the Scuola Libera di Pittura in Rome and in 1908 began working as a restorer and decorator.Castello di Mesola 1987, p. 102. He continued his studies at the Accademia di Belle Arti in Rome, where

Armando Spadini Armando Spadini (1883 - 1925) was an Italian painter and one of the representatives of the so-called Scuola Romana. Biography Spadini was born in Florence on July 29, 1883. Armando Spadini, the son of a craftsman and a seamstress from Poggio a C ...

influenced him. He had few opportunities to view contemporary French art, and instead immersed himself in the study of artists of the Italian Renaissance such as

Giotto Giotto di Bondone (; – January 8, 1337), known mononymously as Giotto ( , ) and Latinised as Giottus, was an Italian painter and architect from Florence during the Late Middle Ages. He worked during the Gothic/Proto-Renaissance period. Giot ...

Piero della Francesca Piero della Francesca (, also , ; – 12 October 1492), originally named Piero di Benedetto, was an Italian painter of the Early Renaissance. To contemporaries he was also known as a mathematician and geometer. Nowadays Piero della Francesca i ...

, and

Correggio Antonio Allegri da Correggio (August 1489 – 5 March 1534), usually known as just Correggio (, also , , ), was the foremost painter of the Parma school of the High Italian Renaissance, who was responsible for some of the most vigorous and sens ...

, and later masters such as

Caravaggio Michelangelo Merisi (Michele Angelo Merigi or Amerighi) da Caravaggio, known as simply Caravaggio (, , ; 29 September 1571 – 18 July 1610), was an Italian painter active in Rome for most of his artistic life. During the final four years of hi ...

. In 1913, he studied the work of Cézanne. In 1915, he participated in the third exhibition of the Rome Secession.Rivosecchi During the decade after the war, Guidi painted modern subject matter in a tonality influenced by the Venetians. He gave his figures a timeless appearance by simplifying clothing details and emphasizing volumes. His painting ''The Visit'' (1922), which he exhibited at the Venice Biennale of 1922, is one of his many depictions of two women meeting. The composition is reminiscent of a traditional

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, according to Jennifer Mundy, and "marks the end of Guidi's exploration of museum styles and is a confident statement of a new Renaissance-inspired realism in his art." Critical success eluded Guidi until 1924 when he exhibited ''The Tram'' (1923) at the Venice Biennale. The painting brought Guidi recognition as a leading artist of the "

return to order The return to order ( French: ''retour à l'ordre'') was a European art movement that followed the First World War, rejecting the extreme avant-garde art of the years up to 1918 and taking its inspiration from classical art instead. The movement ...

". In 1925

Franz Roh Franz Roh (21 February 1890 – 30 December 1965), was a German historian, photographer, and art critic. Roh is perhaps best known for his 1925 book ''Nach-Expressionismus: Magischer Realismus: Probleme der neuesten europäischen Malerei'' ("Post ...

termed him one of the new magic realists in his book ''Nach Expressionismus: Magischer Realismus: Probleme der neuesten europäischen Malerei'' ("After expressionism: Magical Realism: Problems of the newest European painting"). Guidi exhibited in the first and second ''

Novecento Italiano Novecento Italiano () was an Italian artistic movement founded in Milan in 1922 to create an art based on the rhetoric of the fascism of Benito Mussolini, Mussolini. History Novecento Italiano was founded by Anselmo Bucci (1887–1955), Leonardo ...

'' exhibitions in 1926 and 1929. In 1927, he married Anita Bernardi, a sculptor. He began teaching at the Accademia di Belle Arti in Venice. In 1933, he visited Paris for the first time. He had his first solo exhibition in Florence in 1932, followed by solo shows in Milan in 1933 and 1936. In 1935, he moved to Bologna. After World War II, his work was increasingly abstract. In 1950, he became associated with

Lucio Fontana Lucio Fontana (; 19 February 1899 – 7 September 1968) was an Argentine-Italian painter, sculptor and theorist. He is mostly known as the founder of Spatialism. Early life Born in Rosario, to Italian immigrant parents, he was t ...

and the Spazialismo movement.Castello di Mesola 1987, p. 103. From the 1950s onward, he produced thematic cycles of paintings, such as ''Tumulti'' ("Riots"), ''Prigioniera'' ("Prisoner"), ''Grandi Occhi'' ("Big Eyes"), ''Cielo'' ("Sky"), and ''Figure agitate'' ("Agitated Figures"). In 1959, he published a collection of poetry, ''Spazi dell’esistenza''.

Notes

References

*Cowling, Elizabeth; Jennifer Mundy (1990). ''On Classic Ground: Picasso, Léger, de Chirico and the New Classicism 1910-1930''. London: Tate Gallery. . *Castello di Mesola (Mesola, Italy); Laura Gavioli; Vittorio Sgarbi; Fabio Benzi; Toni Toniato (1987). ''Virgilio Guidi, 1912-1948''. Milano: Mazzotta. . *Rivosecchi, Valerio. "Guidi, Virgilio." ''Grove Art Online. Oxford Art Online''. Oxford University Press. {{DEFAULTSORT:Guidi, Virgilio 1891 births 1984 deaths Painters from Rome 20th-century Italian painters Italian male painters Modern painters Magic realist artists 20th-century Italian male artists