DOI Heft:
No. 133 (March, 1908)
DOI Artikel:Melani, Alfredo: An Italian "Luminist": Carlo Fornara
DOI Seite / Zitierlink: https://doi.org/10.11588/diglit.28254#0064
Carlo Fornara, Italian “ Luminist”
delicate beauty of this
artist’s work (to which M.
Calderini, his disciple, de-
voted a volume, the very
apotheosis of a poet’s soul)
induced Fornara to do a
series of little pictures,
mysterious hymns dedicated
to the light, inspired by his
valleys, or Chopinesque
melodies—nocturnes and
twilight songs, indicating
the sweet repose of a soul
which from time to time
awakes from the shadows
to the lyrics of the sunlight
in “luminous” or “divi-
sionist” works of the most
advanced kind.
So, from sadness to stri-
“ en plein air”
and this gives his paintings an aspect different from
that of the “ pointillistes.” The style is indeed
that of Segantini and of Gaetano Previati.
“ Was it not perfectly natural, the adoption of
this particular application of colour on the part of
a painter who strove to achieve energetic and
luminous painting?” asked Fornara, half-replying
to those who were trying to set him down as a
deliberate derivative of Segantini. And did not
Segantini, too, rejoice in
admiring J. F. Millet?
Moreover, at the time when
Fornara and Segantini met,
the latter was not esteemed
as he has been since. On
the contrary, and especially
in Milan he had many
fierce enemies—this in the
place where even the sun
of Tranquillo Cremona,
Mose Bianchi, and Giuseppe
Grandi had not succeeded
in enlightening public per-
ception.
Since his first acquaint-
ance with the “ Seganti-
nian” canvases till the pre-
sent day Fornara has con-
tinued his researches. In
1892 he was enticed to
Turin by Antonio Fonta-
nesi. At that period the “autumn” by carlo fornara
44
by carlo fornara dent laughter, the spirit of
Fornara continues to seek
out beauty, and guides us to those luminous sights
of nature which the painter, with his love of his
native valleys, continues to interrogate with enthu-
siasm, while cultivating his mind by reading the
most modern and the most suggestive authors,
from J. K. Huysmans to John Ruskin. He lives
in his vallej7, and the Valle d’Ossola beholds in
him its own poet, full of verve and sincerity.
Alfredo Melani.
delicate beauty of this
artist’s work (to which M.
Calderini, his disciple, de-
voted a volume, the very
apotheosis of a poet’s soul)
induced Fornara to do a
series of little pictures,
mysterious hymns dedicated
to the light, inspired by his
valleys, or Chopinesque
melodies—nocturnes and
twilight songs, indicating
the sweet repose of a soul
which from time to time
awakes from the shadows
to the lyrics of the sunlight
in “luminous” or “divi-
sionist” works of the most
advanced kind.
So, from sadness to stri-
“ en plein air”
and this gives his paintings an aspect different from
that of the “ pointillistes.” The style is indeed
that of Segantini and of Gaetano Previati.
“ Was it not perfectly natural, the adoption of
this particular application of colour on the part of
a painter who strove to achieve energetic and
luminous painting?” asked Fornara, half-replying
to those who were trying to set him down as a
deliberate derivative of Segantini. And did not
Segantini, too, rejoice in
admiring J. F. Millet?
Moreover, at the time when
Fornara and Segantini met,
the latter was not esteemed
as he has been since. On
the contrary, and especially
in Milan he had many
fierce enemies—this in the
place where even the sun
of Tranquillo Cremona,
Mose Bianchi, and Giuseppe
Grandi had not succeeded
in enlightening public per-
ception.
Since his first acquaint-
ance with the “ Seganti-
nian” canvases till the pre-
sent day Fornara has con-
tinued his researches. In
1892 he was enticed to
Turin by Antonio Fonta-
nesi. At that period the “autumn” by carlo fornara
44
by carlo fornara dent laughter, the spirit of
Fornara continues to seek
out beauty, and guides us to those luminous sights
of nature which the painter, with his love of his
native valleys, continues to interrogate with enthu-
siasm, while cultivating his mind by reading the
most modern and the most suggestive authors,
from J. K. Huysmans to John Ruskin. He lives
in his vallej7, and the Valle d’Ossola beholds in
him its own poet, full of verve and sincerity.
Alfredo Melani.