Giorgio Morandi (Bologna, 1890 – 1964)

Education
He graduates at the Accademia di Belle Arti (Fine Arts Academy) of Bologna in 1913 where he meets Osvaldo Licini, Severo Pozzati, Giacomo Vespignani and Mario Bacchelli, the friends-artists he exhibits in 1914 at Hotel Baglioni in Bologna with.
His education is based on the study of the great masters: from Giotto to Piero della Francesca, from Chardin to Corot, up to Cézanne. Since the very beginning, Morandi prefers as subjects of his works landscapes, still lifes and flowers that will represent the essential themes of his whole work.

The exhibitions
Since 1928 he participates in some editions of the Venice Biennale, in the Quadriennale in Rome and he exhibits as well in several Italian and foreign cities. From 1930 to 1956 he teaches Etching techniques at the Accademia di Belle Arti of Bologna and during these years he created most of his etchings. Only in his maturity he dedicates instead his time with continuity to watercolours, after some rare and isolated tests in the 1910s and in the 1930s.
Even if he rarely goes far away from Bologna and Grizzana, the village on the Appennines where he’s used to spend every summer, his fame begins to grow and to go beyond the walls of the city thanks to sharp and smart critics and to a selected group of art lovers and collectors.

The international success
The international success arrives in 1948 with the First Prize for Painting at Venice Biennale, followed by two first prices at Biennale in Sao Paolo, Brazil in 1953 and 1957, for etching and painting respectively, and the Rubens Prize awarded by the city of Siegen in 1962.