Faenza celebrates the Art Nouveau flair of Achille Calzi

An exhibition to celebrate the inspiration of Achille Calzi (Faenza, 1873 - 1919), a great ceramist of Art Nouveau Italy, is the one being held at MIC - Museo Internazionale delle Ceramiche di Faenza from November 4, 2017 to February 18, 2018, curated by Ilaria Piazza, who began working on this exhibition as early as 2013, when Calzi’s heirs donated a substantial nucleus of works to MIC. The exhibition is titled Between Symbolism and Art Nouveau. Achille Calzi and takes its starting point precisely from this nucleus that will be enriched with works from public and private collections, which will form an important unpublished monograph on one of the leading artists of Art Nouveau in Italy.

It was also thanks to him that ceramics embraced the new artistic dictates circulating in Europe at the time, but not only: he applied ceramics to architecture and industry as well, experimenting in this sense with paths unheard of in Italy. The artist succeeded in these intentions thanks to his versatility: trained in Faenza, he also came to hold the position of the local Pinacoteca Civica as well as the School of Drawing and Plastics, was an art historian and lecturer, and directed the Riunite Ceramiche factories where he worked on the design of ceramics on a large to scale. He was also an artist attentive to what was happening outside Italy, traveled extensively abroad, and maintained contacts with the most distinguished artistic and intellectual figures of the time, from Gabriele D’Annunzio to Giosuè Carducci, from Giuseppe Pellizza da Volpedo to Arturo Martini.

“Calzi,” explains the curator, “embodied the modern figure of the artist-designer, making himself the interpreter of the modernist principle of art in everything, through his numerous collaborations with the main Faenza manufactures active in the fields of ceramics, cabinet-making and wrought iron, and in his commitment to graphic design. Added to this is the multifaceted research in the figurative arts, from decoration to black and white, from easel painting to caricature, where he transposes some of the most advanced national and international artistic trends. While macabre visions, steeped in mysterious and esoteric suggestions, mark his adherence to Symbolism, his pictorial language welcomes experimentation with a Divisionist imprint. Between local references and international influences lies his activity as a caricaturist and author of satirical images, where Calzi also manifests his patriotic sentiment in the series of cartoons made at the end of World War I in support of the home front.”

The exhibition, realized with the support of the Emilia-Romagna Region, with contributions from BCC-Credito Cooperativo Ravennate Forlivese & Imolese, Gruppo Hera, Fondazione Cassa di Risparmio di Forlì and SACMI, is part of a series of exhibitions that MIC has dedicated over the years to various international masters to whom it wants to give due recognition.

The exhibition opens daily (except Monday, which is closed). Tuesday through Friday 10 a.m. to 1:30 p.m. and Saturday, Sunday and holidays 10 a.m. to 5:30 p.m. Closed on December 25 and January 1. Full admission 8 euros, reduced 5 euros, reduced student 3 euros. For all info: 0546 697311, www.micfaenza.org.

Image: Achille Calzi, Dish with Barn Owl (1919).

Faenza celebrates the Art Nouveau flair of Achille Calzi

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