Filippo Boldini in Lugano's public collections: an exhibition at Pinacoteca Züst

Filippo Boldini in Lugano’s public collections, curated by Alessandra Brambilla, traces the entire career of Filippo Boldini (Paradiso, 1900 - Lugano, 1989), a much-loved and collected artist in Canton Ticino, to whom exhibitions and publications have been dedicated. The exhibition, scheduled from April 2 to September 3, 2023 at the Pinacoteca Cantonale Giovanni Züst in Rancate (Mendrisio) in Canton Ticino, Switzerland, touches on all the themes he loved: flowers, still lifes, figures, religious themes, landscapes, from the works of the 1930s, still with a naturalistic bent, to the “Novecentista” phase and then the Cubist phase, to the soft and fuzzy atmospheres of the 1980s.

The reference points dear to him are the Tuscan Quattrocento, Cézanne, Braque, but also Giorgio Morandi, the Italian Novecento and Carlo Carrà. For the choice of works, the organizers decided to make a selection from the rich funds donated by the painter to Lugano’s public collections: about two hundred paintings and drawings to the Municipality of Paradiso, about twenty to the City of Lugano and the State, with the integration of some purchases made by the latter. The catalog published to accompany the exhibition presents for the first time the complete and illustrated inventory of these bequests.

Also presented are sixteen sketches from a private collection-almost all of them previously unpublished-which he made between the 1930s and the early 1960s, making it possible to document a little-known aspect of his work, such as his participation in competitions for the mural decoration of public buildings. An activity parallel to easel painting that, together with other occupations, such as making mosaics and reliefs, including for funerary monuments, or restoration, marked much of the artistic career of many artists in decades marked by a difficult economic situation.

Also presented on this occasion are two rooms of the rearranged permanent collection, with works from the 16th to the 18th century (Francesco De Tatti, Giovanni Serodine, Pierfrancesco Mola, Giuseppe Antonio Petrini). A section is also devoted to paintings that have recently entered the Pinacoteca’s collections thanks to purchases or donations: these are painters who have already been the subject of exhibitions at Rancate, such as Fausto Agnelli, Emilio Oreste Brunati, and Rosetta Leins. On the other hand, Augusto Sartori’s Humanity is on public display for the first time, after a group show held in 1919 in Basel.

The Sections of the Exhibition.

In the first section (“Masters and Colleagues: Antonio Barzaghi Cattaneo, Mario Bernasconi, Giuseppe Foglia, Carlo Cotti), alongside two self-portraits, one encounters the artists who most closely marked the early stages of his career. Born in Paradiso in 1900, Boldini frequented the home of the elderly Antonio Barzaghi Cattaneo almost daily. An erudite painter with an academic bent, Barzaghi provided the young ”Nino" with the basics he needed to begin painting; the multimedia station features a short interview in which Boldini tells us about their bond. The sculptor Mario Bernasconi, his cousin and friend, leaves us Filippo’s beautiful plaster portrait on display here. Also on display is a painting by Giuseppe Foglia, a painter and sculptor who lived near Boldini on Viale Cassarate in Lugano. The room is completed by a corner that gives evidence of the relationship with Carlo Cotti, who in 1940, together with Giuseppe Soldati, had courageously founded in Lugano a Figure School also attended by Boldini; traces of this experience are found in a series of Nudes. To Cotti belonged the easel and chair exhibited next to the painting The Cyclamen, in which they are seen reproduced.

The second section (“Friends of Pen and Brush”) delves into the artist and his frequentations. With a conspicuous number of participations in exhibitions in Ticino and the rest of Switzerland to his credit, solo exhibitions and monographs have been dedicated to Boldini. These include at least the one held in 1993 by the City of Paradiso, edited by Rudy Chiappini, and the most recent, thorough and in-depth one given to the presses by Claudio Guarda in 2000. But who was Filippo Boldini? By all who knew him he is described as shy, reserved, solitary, but, as was ascertained during the research for the exhibition, not isolated and, indeed, a lover of conversations with friends, few, carefully chosen, but true. Over the course of his long life he built a dense and solid network of relationships with critics, intellectuals, writers, painters, and sculptors who appreciated his qualities as a man and an artist. On display in this room, by way of example, are works, traced on this occasion and almost always presented to the public for the first time, that Boldini had given to friends, thus bearing witness to the ties established. Among them recur several names of artists who supported each other in various ways-sometimes taking sides in the press-and portrayed each other, such as Mario Bernasconi, Mario Moglia, Ubaldo Monico, Pietro Salati, Nag Arnoldi, Giovanni Genucchi, and Mario Marioni). There were also many important personalities active on the Ticino cultural scene, such as Eros Bellinelli or Walter Schönenberger, who dealt with him in tones that were not infrequently affectionate, often admiring, always polite, even in the case of figures of notoriously strong and demanding character, such as Piero Bianconi or Virgilio Gilardoni, organizer of the latter’latter in Locarno, in 1959, of the solo exhibition that would mark a real turning point in Boldini’s career, with whom he established a bond of friendship and affection that would last a lifetime. Remo Beretta is to be counted among the first authoritative voices to unreservedly recognize his qualities, in 1954.

Various critics compare his painting to poetry from time to time: Adriano Soldini, who traces there the atmospheres of Carlo Linati, Giorgio Orelli, who likens it to the verses of Pascoli and Carducci, while others find there the spirit of Tozzi. To the postwar period dates his meeting and the birth of his friendship with Mario Agliati, who would give much space to interventions involving him in the pages of "Il Cantonetto." One of the themes the two discussed, amid bitterness and sadness, was the building havoc that was sweeping Lugano and all of Ticino in those years: it is a country crumbling before everyone’s eyes and that Boldini seems to try to fix in the delicate atmospheres of his paintings. Angelo Casè, too, in the booklet Un’amicizia (ESG, Edizioni Svizzere per la Gioventù) illustrated by his brother Pierre, insists on this sensitivity of the painter for the Ticino landscape. In the 1970s he had begun to frequent Claudio Nembrini, who would be his friend until the end. To him he would donate the Landscape exhibited here, which he had chosen for the room in which he was hospitalized before he passed away on October 27, 1989.

The third section (“Projects for Public Competitions”) presents fresco and oil sketches made by Boldini between the 1930s and the early 1960s, which make it possible to document a little-known aspect of his work, such as his participation in competitions for the mural decoration of public buildings. A series of them belongs to a private collection and is presented in an exhibition for the first time. An activity parallel to easel painting that, together with other occupations, such as making mosaics, reliefs, cemetery art, or restoration, marked much of the artistic career of many artists in decades marked by a difficult economic situation. In the interval between the two world wars, art related to public architecture reached its peak throughout Europe, a trend that also touched Canton Ticino and constituted an indispensable working opportunity for Boldini as well. From the mid-1930s until the 1950s his participation in the most important competitions in the canton is attested. Often among the first runners-up and among the prize-winners, the artist was never given a commission for the work. He was, however, entrusted with the decoration of the mortuary of Lugano’s Monumental Cemetery for which, in 1960, he created the mosaic The Comfort, which is no longer available. On display next to it are preparatory drawings and a sketch. Still visible in situ is the Life and Death mosaic from 1961 on the lunette of the cemetery’s northern entrance pavilion, which housed the mortuary. In some cases, it was possible to identify and link some of the works to specific competitions, thanks in part to the “mottos” indicated on the back: words or phrases that the artists used to conceal their identities during the selections in the competition. This is the case, for example, with the one announced by the Canton in 1940 for the fresco decoration of the chapels on the steps of the Morcote parish church, of which two of the projects submitted by Boldini, The Presentation of Jesus in the Temple (motto “Jesus”) and The Nativity of Jesus, or the one for the mural painting dedicated to Blessed Nicholas of Flüe in the “Soldiers’ Church” on Mount Ceneri, from 1941, of which, in addition to Boldini’s project, which participates with the motto “Aries,” is also visible in the exhibition, that of the award-winning artist, Felice Filippini.

The design "Acqua Viva" refers to the cantonal competition for the new School of Arts and Crafts in Bellinzona in 1952, as does the painting belonging to the Municipality of Paradiso with the same motto. There are other projects in the collection of the Municipality of Paradiso that provide insight into the works submitted by Boldini to the competition for the pictorial decoration of the grand staircase of the Palazzo Civico in Lugano, announced in 1936 by the Municipality, where the artist participated with the motto “Attività paesana” or to the one announced in 1951 by the Canton for the decoration of the main hall of the Cantonal School of Commerce in Bellinzona (today the Federal Criminal Court), where the artist presents the projects Agriculture, Building, Emigration with the motto “777.” Various sketches with religious scenes, for which the exact destination could not be ascertained, probably preparatory studies for a Stations of the Cross, for a cycle with Scenes from the Life of Christ or for individual commissions.

The fourth section (“La Dolce Annaly”) is about affections. Boldini leads a secluded and quiet life, far from worldliness. His only documented trip is the one he took in his youth to Tuscany, where his family sent him partly to forget an ill-fated love affair and partly for reasons of study: here he could be confronted with the art of the 15th century, from Beato Angelico to Masaccio, remaining deeply impressed. In 1927 he married Maria Juon (1888-1973), known as Marily, who would prove to be an irreplaceable companion; there was a sincere affection between them, and she supported him through the most difficult years, during which often the only regular source of livelihood for the family was her salary as cashier at the Supercinema in Lugano. From their union was born a daughter, Anna (1927-1953), familiarly known as Annaly. The little girl was portrayed on several occasions by her father, and an entire section was devoted to her in the exhibition. In 1945 Annaly began to show signs of the degenerative disease that would lead to her paralysis and death at just twenty-six years of age in 1953, leaving an indelible mark on the soul of her affectionate father. This family drama marked the painter’s existence forever.

In the “Sala delle capriate” where the fifth and last section (“Themes in Boldini’s painting”) is set up, a roundup of works belonging to the Municipality of Paradiso, the City of Lugano, the Art Museum of Italian Switzerland and the State of Canton Ticino is presented. The choice was made taking into consideration also works that were not included in the artist’s donations, but were acquired at different times by the mentioned institutions. The itinerary winds its way through touching on all of Boldini’s beloved themes: flowers, still lifes, portraits and figures, sacred subjects, and landscapes. He came to this genre relatively late, in the 1950s, after having long devoted himself mainly to flowers and still lifes. From a stylistic point of view, it is Boldini himself who recounts his tendencies during an interview with Remo Beretta: "My painting has never been either naturalistic or in another way (at least fundamentally) impressionistic. I have always aimed at stylization, and if ever an indentation is to be sought in the painting of the 15th and 20th century Italy, especially Tuscany. But always on this side of the dissolution of the object. Whether I can reach this dissolution in the future is unpredictable, and it would not be unnatural at the present point. I follow sincere informal experiences with interest."

For the rest, it is his painting that speaks to us of the other points of reference dear to him: in addition to Beato Angelico and Masaccio, Cézanne, Braque, but also Giorgio Morandi, the Italian Novecento and Carlo Carrà, who also exhibited in Ticino and gave lectures in the 1940s and 1950s. The influence of his magic realism and return to order produced disruptive effects on a whole generation of Ticino artists. In Boldini, points of contact are found mainly in some landscapes of the 1950s, exhibited here alongside a work by the Piedmontese master. On the other hand, it is easy to recognize the influence of Cézanne and Morandi, whose precious etching is presented here, in a series of still lifes, before his move in the 1980s to a lighter palette and decomposed forms. Also presented here are some still lifes with skulls, a genre to which Boldini was to devote himself with some insistence between the 1970s and 1980s. Next to them is a painting by Franco Francese with the same subject-the two had exhibited together in 1966.

“The opportunity to return to talk about Filippo Boldini more than two decades after the last exhibition was provided to us by sixteen privately owned sketches that, re-emerging from the mists of history, have been reported to the Pinacoteca Züst,” Mariangela Agliati Ruggia, director of the Pinacoteca Cantonale Giovanni Züst, writes in the text presenting the exhibition. “These are panels, to be executed later in fresco, submitted to public competitions or for works commissioned by private individuals. They are a demonstration of Boldini’s attempts to open up, in addition to easel painting, a space for himself in that sphere. Although the painter often made it to the finals, where he was also rewarded with pecuniary rewards, he almost never got a commission. The preparatory studies were left in the painter’s house. They are painted on Heraklith, compressed wood wool usually used as insulation, including sound insulation, in construction. In Lugano it was introduced as a support for painting by Carlo Cotti and also used by Filippini and, indeed, by Boldini. It was therefore decided to present to the public for the first time this practically unpublished material, evidence of a little-known aspect of the painter’s activity, by entrusting its study to Cristina Brazzola (MASI - Museo d’arte della Svizzera italiana). Alongside these sketches, Boldini’s works present in Lugano’s public collections and preserved at MASI and the Municipality of Paradiso are exhibited at Rancate. A valuable review therefore, the result of collaboration between different but also complementary institutions, to which is added the Villa dei Cedri Museum in Bellinzona, which has been the depository of works owned by the Municipality of Paradiso for some years.”

Filippo Boldini in Lugano's public collections: an exhibition at Pinacoteca Züst

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