Enrico Coleman (21 or 25 June 1846 – 14 February 1911) was an Italian painter of British nationality. He was the son of the English painter Charles Coleman and brother of the less well-known Italian painter

Francesco Coleman Francesco Coleman (1851–1918) was an Italian painter. He was the son of the English painter Charles Coleman and brother of the better-known Italian painter Enrico Coleman. He was known as a painter, in oil and in water-colour, of the people a ...

. He painted, in oils and in watercolours, the landscapes of the

Campagna Romana The Roman Campagna () is a low-lying area surrounding Rome in the Lazio region of central Italy, with an area of approximately . It is bordered by the Tolfa and Sabatini mountains to the north, the Alban Hills to the southeast, and the Tyrrhenia ...

and the

Agro Pontino 250px, Lake Fogliano, a coastal lagoon in the Pontine Plain The Pontine Marshes (, also ; it, Agro Pontino , formerly also ''Paludi Pontine''; la, Pomptinus Ager by Titus Livius, ''Pomptina Palus'' (singular) and ''Pomptinae Paludes'' (plur ...

; he was a collector, grower and painter of orchids. Because of his supposedly Oriental air, he was known to his friends as "Il Birmano", the Burmese.

Life

Enrico Coleman was born in Rome in June 1846. He was the fourth child of the English painter Charles Coleman, who had come to Rome in 1831 and settled there permanently in 1835, and of a famous

artist's model An art model poses, often nude, for visual artists as part of the creative process, providing a reference for the human body in a work of art. As an occupation, modeling requires the often strenuous ' physical work' of holding poses for the requ ...

from Subiaco, Fortunata Segadori (or Segatori), whom he had married in 1836. Coleman was initially taught by his father, and either did or did not study at the Accademia di San Luca in Rome. Following the mocking reception of ''Una mandria di bufali nelle paludi pontine'', a naturalistic painting of a herd of buffaloes in the Pontine marshes, at the International Artist's Club in 1872, he reportedly began to paint genre subjects in the manner of the thenfashionable Mariano Fortuny, although no works showing the influence of the Spanish painter are known. At the instigation of

Nino Costa Giovanni Costa (15 October 1826 – 31 January 1903), often known as Nino Costa, was an Italian landscape painter and patriotic revolutionary. Biography Giovanni Costa was born in Rome on 15 October 1826, the fourteenth of the sixteen childr ...

, he soon returned to the depiction of the people, animals and landscapes of the

and the

. An album of watercolours from this youthful period (1871–1875) was recently rediscovered and was shown in Rome in 2004. Coleman was lover of orchids, which he painted, collected and cultivated. A famous album of 88 orchid paintings, either in watercolour or in gouache, painted in the 1890s and entitled ''Orchidea Birmana'' was sold to an Englishman; it was "rediscovered" in the 1980s and published in facsimile. An 1894 watercolour of orchids is in the

Galleria Comunale d'Arte Moderna e Contemporanea Galleria may refer to Shopping centres named ''Galleria'' Australia *Galleria Shopping Centre (Perth), Morley, Western Australia *Galleria Shopping Centre (Melbourne), Melbourne, Victoria Canada *Allen Lambert Galleria, Toronto, Ontario *Gal ...

in Rome. Coleman had a remarkable collection of indigenous orchids, which he cultivated himself in special boxes at his house at 6 via Valenziana. He successfully hybridised ''

Orchis provincialis ''Orchis provincialis'', the Provence orchid, is a species of orchid in the genus ''Orchis''. Description ''Orchis provincialis'' is a herbaceous plant high. The 4-5 basal leaves are oblong-lanceolate, with a length of about 8 cm and ar ...

'' var. ''pauciflora'' and '' Orchis mascula'' var. ''rosea''; the botanist

Fabrizio Cortesi ''Fabrizio Cortesi'' (1879-1949) was an Italian botanist. He collected in Italy and Ethiopia. He was the third Conservator of the Orto Botanico dell'Università di Catania, following Peter Romualdo Pirotta and Emilio Chiovenda. He was also Assoc ...

named the hybrid ''Orchis'' x ''colemanii'' Cortesi in his honour. In 1875, Coleman was among the founding members of the Società degli Acquarellisti, the Roman society of watercolourists; he participated in the society's first exhibition in 1876, and continued to exhibit with them until 1907. In 1878 he was elected an honorary member of the Société Royale Belge des Aquarellistes, the Belgian royal society of watercolourists, with which he participated in the

Salon de Paris The Salon (french: Salon), or rarely Paris Salon (French: ''Salon de Paris'' ), beginning in 1667 was the official art exhibition of the Académie des Beaux-Arts in Paris. Between 1748 and 1890 it was arguably the greatest annual or biennial art ...

in 1879. From then on he began to exhibit regularly. He sent paintings to the 4th Esposizione Nazionale di Belle Arti, or national fine art show, of Turin in 1880, and to that of Milan in the following year; he showed works in London in 1882 and in Rome in 1883. In 1885, Coleman was among the founding members of the group ''In Arte Libertas'', of which Nino Costa was the leading force and the other founding members were Vincenzo Cabianca,

Onorato Carlandi Onorato Carlandi (15 May 1848, in Rome – 11 April 1939, in Rome) was an Italian painter, mainly of watercolors of Rome, the surrounding countryside and of Great Britain. He was married to the painter, Lina Haverty (?-1950), daughter of the Iri ...

, , , ,

Giuseppe Raggio Giuseppe Raggio (1823–1916) was an Italian painter. Life and career He was born in Chiavari, and while his father wished him to join the merchant marine, by 1845 he had decided to study painting, and participated in his first exhibition in Ge ...

, Alessandro Ricci,

Mario de Maria Mario or Marius de Maria (9 September 1852 – 1924) was an Italian painter, known for depicting nocturnal landscapes, and gaining the label by the contemporary poet Gabriele D’Annunzio, as the ''painter of moons''. Biography He was born in Bo ...

and . Coleman had six paintings in the first exhibition of the group, which took place from 10–28 February 1886, in the studio of an amateur painter named Giorgi, at 72 via S. Nicola da Tolentino. He participated in some measure in all of the subsequent annual exhibitions. From 1895 to 1899 the group exhibited collectively at the Esposizione Internazionale d'Arte della Città di Venezia, which would later become the Biennale di Venezia; Coleman continued to exhibit in every edition until the ninth in 1910. Shortly after the death of Costa in 1903, ''In Arte Libertas'' was transformed into a new society, the "XXV della Campagna Romana". The XXV was born in the trattoria "Il Pozzo di San Patrizio" on the via Nomentana, on the evening of 24 May 1904. Coleman was elected "capocetta", "little head" or president, for life. The other members included Giuseppe and

Ettore Ferrari Ettore Ferrari (Rome, 25 March 1845 – Rome, 19 August 1929) was an Italian sculptor. Biography Born in Rome to an artistic family (his father was also a painter), Ferrari was one of the members of the artistic rebirth in the secular state bo ...

, Onorato Carlandi,

Giulio Aristide Sartorio ] Giulio Aristide Sartorio (11 February 1860 – 3 October 1932) was an List of Italian painters, Italian painter and film director from Rome. Biography Having attended the Rome Institute of Fine Arts, Sartorio presented a Symbolist work at the ...

, members of the earlier group, who were joined by

Cesare Pascarella Cesare Pascarella (28 April 1858 - 8 May 1940), was an Italian dialect poet and a painter. He was appointed to the Royal Academy of Italy in 1930. Pascarella was born in Rome and initially was a painter. His literary activity began in 1881 wit ...

Arturo Noci Arturo Noci (1874–1953) was an Italian Italian(s) may refer to: * Anything of, from, or related to the people of Italy over the centuries ** Italians, an ethnic group or simply a citizen of the Italian Republic or Italian Kingdom ** Italian lan ...

Lorenzo Cecconi Lorenzo Cecconi (13 August 1863 – April 1947) was an Italian painter, restorer, and curator. Background Born in Rome, Lorenzo Cecconi was the son of a painting restorer. He studied in Rome at the Accademia di San Luca, under the guidance of Aur ...

, , ,

Amedeo Amedeo is an Italian given name meaning "lover of God", "loves God", or more correctly "for the love of God" and cognate to the Latin name Amadeus and the Spanish and Portuguese Amadeo. People with this name include: * A number of rulers and noble ...

and , and others. Enrico Coleman never married. Although he kept his British nationality throughout his life, he never visited Britain. The only large city he ever saw was Turin. According to Diego Angeli, apart from that one journey, he never went further north than Monte Soratte, nor further south than

Terracina Terracina is an Italian city and ''comune'' of the province of Latina, located on the coast southeast of Rome on the Via Appia ( by rail). The site has been continuously occupied since antiquity. History Ancient times Terracina appears in anci ...

. As well as painting and orchids, he loved shooting and mountain-climbing. He was among the early members of the

Club Alpino Italiano The Club Alpino Italiano is the senior Italian alpine club which stages climbing competitions, operates alpine huts, marks and maintains paths, and is active in protecting the Alpine environment. It was founded in Turin in 1863 by the then finan ...

, which he joined in 1881, and of which he was made an honorary member for life in 1906. The club published his panorama of the

Gran Sasso d'Italia Gran Sasso d'Italia (; ) is a massif in the Apennine Mountains of Italy. Its highest peak, Corno Grande (2,912 metres), is the highest mountain in the Apennines, and the second-highest mountain in Italy outside the Alps. The mountain lies wit ...

in 1884, and awarded him a gold medal at the Esposizione Alpina, or mountaineering exhibition, in Bologna in 1888. He died in Rome of pleurisy in the night of either 14 February 1911 or 4 February 1911, and is buried in the non-Catholic cemetery of

Testaccio Testaccio is the 20th ''rione'' of Rome, identified by the initials R. XX, deriving its name from Monte Testaccio. It is located within the Municipio I. Its coat of arms depicts an ''amphora'', referencing to the broken vessels that Monte Test ...

; the date on his gravestone is calculated from the foundation of Rome. Later the same year, he was the only artist to have a whole room dedicated to him at the Esposizione internazionale d'arte in Rome, in which forty-nine of his works, both oils and watercolours, were hung by a group of his friends. In the exhibitions of

Castel Sant'Angelo The Mausoleum of Hadrian, usually known as Castel Sant'Angelo (; English: ''Castle of the Holy Angel''), is a towering cylindrical building in Parco Adriano, Rome, Italy. It was initially commissioned by the Roman Emperor Hadrian as a mausol ...

for the 50th anniversary of the unification of Italy, his watercolours of mountain landscapes formed part of the exhibit of the Club Alpino Italiano. On the anniversary of Coleman's death, thirty of his works from the collection of his sister Giorgina were shown at the Studio Jandolo at 52a,

via Margutta Via Margutta is a narrow street in the centre of Rome, near Piazza del Popolo, accessible from Via del Babuino in the ancient Campo Marzio neighborhood also known as ''"the foreigner's quarter"''. Mount Pincio is nearby. Via Margutta original ...

, on the initiative of Onorato Carlandi, Diego Angeli, Arturo Lancellotti and Jandolo himself.

Published works

* 'Panorama invernale del Gran Sasso d'Italia' (Chromolithograph) in ''Bollettino del Club Alpino Italiano'' Torino: Fratelli Doyen 1884. XVII:50 tavola VII * Gabriele d'Annunziobr>''Isaotta Guttadàuro ed altre poesie: con disegni di Vincenzo Cabianca, Onorato Carlandi, Giuseppe Cellini, Enrico Coleman, Mario de Maria, Cesare Formilli, Alessandro Morani, Alfredo Ricci, G.A. Sartorio''
Roma: La Tribuna 1886 * Edoardo de Fonseca ''I castelli romani'' Firenze: Fratelli Alinari 1904

Life

Published works

Notes

References

Further reading