Anselmo Piccoli (September 4, 1915 – July 12, 1992) was an Argentine

Abstract art Abstract art uses visual language of shape, form, color and line to create a Composition (visual arts), composition which may exist with a degree of independence from visual references in the world. ''Abstract art'', ''non-figurative art'', ''non- ...

ist.

Life and work

Anselmo Piccoli was born in

Rosario Rosario () is the largest city in the central provinces of Argentina, Argentine province of Santa Fe Province, Santa Fe. The city, located northwest of Buenos Aires on the west bank of the Paraná River, is the third-most populous city in the ...

Argentina Argentina, officially the Argentine Republic, is a country in the southern half of South America. It covers an area of , making it the List of South American countries by area, second-largest country in South America after Brazil, the fourt ...

in 1915. Politically active as a

Socialist Socialism is an economic ideology, economic and political philosophy encompassing diverse Economic system, economic and social systems characterised by social ownership of the means of production, as opposed to private ownership. It describes ...

during secondary school, Piccoli found time to attend the local Gaspary Academy, where he was trained as a painter. There, he met

Antonio Berni Delesio Antonio Berni (14 May 1905 – 13 October 1981) was an Argentine figurative artist. He is associated with the movement known as ''Nuevo Realismo'' ("New Realism"), an Argentine extension of social realism. His work, including a series o ...

, an increasingly well-known

Figurative art Figurative art, sometimes written as figurativism, describes artwork (particularly paintings and sculptures) that is clearly derived from real object sources and so is, by definition, representational. The term is often in contrast to abstract a ...

ist, in 1932, and Berni became a mentor to the promising young artist. The two began a collaboration on ''Wounded Man'', presented jointly at the local Autumn Art Festival of 1935. The mural, performed in

lacquer Lacquer is a type of hard and usually shiny coating or finish applied to materials such as wood or metal. It is most often made from resin extracted from trees and waxes and has been in use since antiquity. Asian lacquerware, which may be c ...

blown through a tube, proved to be a lasting percent for Piccoli by way of its texture. His work was awarded at a competition in Rosario in 1941 and he joined the Independent Artists' Group, a local

guild A guild ( ) is an association of artisans and merchants who oversee the practice of their craft/trade in a particular territory. The earliest types of guild formed as organizations of tradespeople belonging to a professional association. They so ...

in 1942. The following year, Piccoli was awarded his first personal art exhibition at Rosario's prestigious Juan B. Castagnino Fine Arts Museum. Lydia 1959

Piccoli married Lydia Langbart in 1944 and, relocating to the

Buenos Aires Buenos Aires, controlled by the government of the Autonomous City of Buenos Aires, is the Capital city, capital and largest city of Argentina. It is located on the southwest of the Río de la Plata. Buenos Aires is classified as an Alpha− glob ...

suburb of

Burzaco Burzaco is a city in Almirante Brown Partido, Buenos Aires Province, Argentina. It has an area of 22.77 km2, holds a population of 98,859 (). It is 27 kilometres from Buenos Aires city, to which it is linked by the Ferrocarril General Roca So ...

, he devoted himself to family and, though he continued to paint, his art show appearances became less frequent. He was awarded numerous prestigious prizes, notably the inclusion in 1954 of a selection of his work at the Emilio Caraffa Fine Arts Museum in Córdoba. His technique continued to evolve during this interim and, creating a portrait of his wife in 1959, his use of

geometry Geometry (; ) is a branch of mathematics concerned with properties of space such as the distance, shape, size, and relative position of figures. Geometry is, along with arithmetic, one of the oldest branches of mathematics. A mathematician w ...

marked a clear trend in his work towards

Constructivism Constructivism may refer to: Art and architecture * Constructivism (art), an early 20th-century artistic movement that extols art as a practice for social purposes * Constructivist architecture, an architectural movement in the Soviet Union in t ...

. Collecting a body of geometrically-defined work, Piccoli obtained an exhibition in 1969, his first show as a painter in this genre. Piccoli made himself more available to art galleries in the following years, and he garnered numerous awards. Creating increasingly

, a genre popularized in Argentina during the 1970s by

Eduardo Mac Entyre Eduardo Mac Entyre (20 February 1929 – 5 May 2014) was an Argentine artist known for his geometric paintings. Born in Buenos Aires, Argentina to a Scottish father and Belgian mother, Mac Entyre began pursuing his talent for sketches at th ...

, his work was presented in a restropective at the Wildenstein Gallery of Buenos Aires in 1983. His work continued to receive accolades, including the Grand Prize at the National Art Show of 1984. Continuing to paint, he died in 1992 at age 76. His widow donated ''Rhythms in Aluminum'', his last work, to the Castagnino Art Museum in Rosario in 2004, on the occasion of their inaugural of a contemporary art branch.

External links

''Museo Castagnino: Anselmo Piccoli''
File:Paisaje 1955.jpg, ''Landscape'', oil on paperboard, 1955 File:Otoño geometrizado 1967.jpg, ''Autumn Geometry'', oil on metal plate, 1967 File:Balanceo formal 1986.jpg, ''A Formal Balance'', oil on cloth, 1986 {{DEFAULTSORT:Piccoli, Anselmo Argentine abstract painters Argentine people of Italian descent Artists from Rosario, Santa Fe 1915 births 1992 deaths 20th-century Argentine painters Argentine male painters 20th-century Argentine male artists

Life and work

Further reading

External links