Antonio Fontanesi (23 February 1818 – 17 April 1882) was an Italian painter who lived in

Meiji period The is an era of Japanese history that extended from October 23, 1868 to July 30, 1912. The Meiji era was the first half of the Empire of Japan, when the Japanese people moved from being an isolated feudal society at risk of colonization ...

Japan Japan ( ja, 日本, or , and formally , ''Nihonkoku'') is an island country in East Asia. It is situated in the northwest Pacific Ocean, and is bordered on the west by the Sea of Japan, while extending from the Sea of Okhotsk in the n ...

between 1876 and 1878. He introduced European

oil painting Oil painting is the process of painting with pigments with a medium of drying oil as the binder. It has been the most common technique for artistic painting on wood panel or canvas for several centuries, spreading from Europe to the rest ...

techniques to Japan, and exerted a significant role in the development of modern Japanese '' yōga'' (Western style) painting. He is known for his works in the romantic style of the French

Barbizon school The Barbizon school of painters were part of an art movement towards Realism in art, which arose in the context of the dominant Romantic Movement of the time. The Barbizon school was active roughly from 1830 through 1870. It takes its name ...

Early life

Fontanesi was born in

Reggio Emilia Reggio nell'Emilia ( egl, Rèz; la, Regium Lepidi), usually referred to as Reggio Emilia, or simply Reggio by its inhabitants, and known until 1861 as Reggio di Lombardia, is a city in northern Italy, in the Emilia-Romagna region. It has abo ...

Emilia-Romagna egl, Emigliàn (man) egl, Emiglièna (woman) rgn, Rumagnòl (man) rgn, Rumagnòla (woman) it, Emiliano (man) it, Emiliana (woman) or it, Romagnolo (man) it, Romagnola (woman) , population_note = , population_blank1_title ...

, and trained with the landscape painters

Prospero Minghetti Prospero Minghetti (January 2, 1786 – February 17, 1853) was an Italian painter. Biography He was born in Reggio Emilia. He first trained locally with Francesco Antonio Camuncoli, then Giovanni Battista Frulli and the engraver Francesco Rosas ...

and Vincenzo Carnevali. From 1841 to 1846 he made

theatre Theatre or theater is a collaborative form of performing art that uses live performers, usually actors or actresses, to present the experience of a real or imagined event before a live audience in a specific place, often a stage. The perfor ...

sets and began painting landscapes. In 1848, he joined a group of Garibaldian volunteers, that went to

Milan Milan ( , , Lombard: ; it, Milano ) is a city in northern Italy, capital of Lombardy, and the second-most populous city proper in Italy after Rome. The city proper has a population of about 1.4 million, while its metropolitan city ...

to fight with the Manara Legion, against the Austrians. In 1859, he was again to briefly join Cavour's armed forces in Bologna. In 1850, he moved to

Geneva Geneva ( ; french: Genève ) frp, Genèva ; german: link=no, Genf ; it, Ginevra ; rm, Genevra is the second-most populous city in Switzerland (after Zürich) and the most populous city of Romandy, the French-speaking part of Switzerland. Situa ...

, where he stayed until 1865. His main area of interest was

landscape painting Landscape painting, also known as landscape art, is the depiction of natural scenery such as mountains, valleys, trees, rivers, and forests, especially where the main subject is a wide view—with its elements arranged into a coherent compo ...

, which he expanded on after visiting the 1855 Exposition Universelle in

Paris Paris () is the capital and most populous city of France, with an estimated population of 2,165,423 residents in 2019 in an area of more than 105 km² (41 sq mi), making it the 30th most densely populated city in the world in 2020. Si ...

. In 1863, he attempted to settle in

London London is the capital and List of urban areas in the United Kingdom, largest city of England and the United Kingdom, with a population of just under 9 million. It stands on the River Thames in south-east England at the head of a estuary dow ...

, but found few commissions or work. he completed a series of watercolors of paintings in the National Gallery. He returned to Florence, where he stayed with the fellow painter

Cristiano Banti Cristiano Banti (4 January 1824 – 4 December 1904) was an Italian genre and landscape painter. He was a leading figure in the Macchiaioli movement of Tuscany. Biography Banti was born into a middle-class family in Santa Croce sull'Arno. A sc ...

. He participated in important artistic exhibitions, displaying his works in

Lyon Lyon,, ; Occitan: ''Lion'', hist. ''Lionés'' also spelled in English as Lyons, is the third-largest city and second-largest metropolitan area of France. It is located at the confluence of the rivers Rhône and Saône, to the northwest of ...

Turin Turin ( , Piedmontese language, Piedmontese: ; it, Torino ) is a city and an important business and cultural centre in Northern Italy. It is the capital city of Piedmont and of the Metropolitan City of Turin, and was the first Italian capital ...

Florence Florence ( ; it, Firenze ) is a city in Central Italy and the capital city of the Tuscany region. It is the most populated city in Tuscany, with 383,083 inhabitants in 2016, and over 1,520,000 in its metropolitan area.Bilancio demografico ...

Genoa Genoa ( ; it, Genova ; lij, Zêna ). is the capital of the Italian region of Liguria and the sixth-largest city in Italy. In 2015, 594,733 people lived within the city's administrative limits. As of the 2011 Italian census, the Province of ...

and the Triennial Exhibition of Fine Art in

Bologna Bologna (, , ; egl, label= Emilian, Bulåggna ; lat, Bononia) is the capital and largest city of the Emilia-Romagna region in Northern Italy. It is the seventh most populous city in Italy with about 400,000 inhabitants and 150 different na ...

. He was nominated professor at the Academy of

Lucca Lucca ( , ) is a city and ''comune'' in Tuscany, Central Italy, on the Serchio River, in a fertile plain near the Ligurian Sea. The city has a population of about 89,000, while its province has a population of 383,957. Lucca is known as one ...

, but moved to Turin when a chair as a landscape professor was created specially for him at the

Accademia Albertina The Accademia Albertina di Belle Arti ("Albertina Academy of Fine Arts") is an institution of higher education in Turin, Italy History In the first half of the seventeenth century, there was a "University of Painters, Sculptors and Architects" ...

in Turin from 1869 to 1876. Among his pupils was

Carlo Follini Carlo Follini (24 August 1848 – 1938) was an Italian painter, depicting landscapes. History He was born in Domodossola in the Piedmont. He studied accounting in Turin, but chose at the age of 24 years to study painting at the Accademia Albert ...

. There are a number of monuments to Fontanesi in his native Reggio Emilia, including the Monument in Parco del Popolo.

Career in Japan

In 1876, the Technical Fine Arts School (''Kobu Bijutsu Gakko''), (later part of the University of Technology, and later the

Tokyo Institute of Technology is a national research university located in Greater Tokyo Area, Japan. Tokyo Tech is the largest institution for higher education in Japan dedicated to science and technology, one of first five Designated National University and selected as ...

), an art school of painting and sculpture was founded in

Tokyo Tokyo (; ja, 東京, , ), officially the Tokyo Metropolis ( ja, 東京都, label=none, ), is the capital and largest city of Japan. Formerly known as Edo, its metropolitan area () is the most populous in the world, with an estimated 37.46 ...

under the supervision of the Ministry of Industry. It was the first governmental art school founded in Japan. Upon recommendation of the Italian minister to Tokyo, Count

Alessandro Fè d'Ostiani Alessandro is both a given name and a surname, the Italian form of the name Alexander. Notable people with the name include: People with the given name Alessandro * Alessandro Allori (1535–1607), Italian portrait painter * Alessandro Baricco ...

, the

Meiji government The was the government that was formed by politicians of the Satsuma Domain and Chōshū Domain in the 1860s. The Meiji government was the early government of the Empire of Japan. Politicians of the Meiji government were known as the Meiji ...

contracted three Italian artists as foreign advisors:

Vincenzo Ragusa Vincenzo Ragusa (8 July 1841 – 13 March 1927) was an Italian sculptor who lived in Meiji period Japan from 1876–1882. He introduced European techniques in bronze casting, and new methods of modeling in wood, clay, plaster and wire ar ...

(1841–1927) for sculpture, Antonio Fontanesi for drawing and

Giovanni Cappelletti Giovanni may refer to: * Giovanni (name), an Italian male given name and surname * Giovanni (meteorology), a Web interface for users to analyze NASA's gridded data * ''Don Giovanni'', a 1787 opera by Wolfgang Amadeus Mozart, based on the legend of ...

(died 1885) for the preparatory course. The trio greatly influenced the development of

Japanese art Japanese art covers a wide range of art styles and media, including Jōmon pottery, ancient pottery, Japanese sculpture, sculpture, Ink wash painting, ink painting and Japanese calligraphy, calligraphy on silk and paper, ''ukiyo-e'' paintings and ...

and

architecture Architecture is the art and technique of designing and building, as distinguished from the skills associated with construction. It is both the process and the product of sketching, conceiving, planning, designing, and constructing buildings ...

through the next several decades. The acceptance of teachers in art from Italy alone was based on the unofficial government policy of accepting military advice from

France France (), officially the French Republic ( ), is a country primarily located in Western Europe. It also comprises of Overseas France, overseas regions and territories in the Americas and the Atlantic Ocean, Atlantic, Pacific Ocean, Pac ...

, industrial advice from

Great Britain Great Britain is an island in the North Atlantic Ocean off the northwest coast of continental Europe. With an area of , it is the largest of the British Isles, the largest European island and the ninth-largest island in the world. It ...

, agricultural advice from the

United States The United States of America (U.S.A. or USA), commonly known as the United States (U.S. or US) or America, is a country Continental United States, primarily located in North America. It consists of 50 U.S. state, states, a Washington, D.C., ...

, and legal and medical advice from

Germany Germany,, officially the Federal Republic of Germany, is a country in Central Europe. It is the second most populous country in Europe after Russia, and the most populous member state of the European Union. Germany is situated betwee ...

. Fontanesi introduced the techniques of

charcoal Charcoal is a lightweight black carbon residue produced by strongly heating wood (or other animal and plant materials) in minimal oxygen to remove all water and volatile constituents. In the traditional version of this pyrolysis process, ...

crayon A crayon (or wax pastel) is a stick of pigmented wax used for writing or drawing. Wax crayons differ from pastels, in which the pigment is mixed with a dry binder such as gum arabic, and from oil pastels, where the binder is a mixture of w ...

and oil paints to his Japanese students, who included

Asai Chū was a Japanese painter, noted for his pioneering work in developing the ''yōga'' (Western-style) art movement in late 19th century and early twentieth-century Japanese painting. Biography Asai was born to an ex-samurai class household in Sakur ...

and Yamamoto Hosui. He also taught western concepts of perspective,

anatomy Anatomy () is the branch of biology concerned with the study of the structure of organisms and their parts. Anatomy is a branch of natural science that deals with the structural organization of living things. It is an old science, having i ...

and sketching from life. His career in Japan was cut short by serious illness, which forced him to return to Italy in 1878.

References

* Mason, Penelope. ''History of Japanese Art''. Prentice Hall (2001). * Sadao Tsuneko, et al. ''Discovering the Arts of Japan: A Historical Overview''. Oxford University Press (2003). * {{DEFAULTSORT:Fontanisi, Antonio 1818 births 1882 deaths People from Reggio Emilia 19th-century Italian painters Italian male painters Italian expatriates in Japan Foreign advisors to the government in Meiji-period Japan Foreign educators in Japan Academic staff of Accademia Albertina 19th-century Italian male artists

Early life

Career in Japan

See also

References