In Ferrara for the excellent exhibition ‘Matisse La Figura’ which follows the theme of the figure throughout his career. Henri Matisse (1869 – 1954) was one of the most influential artists of the 20th century and his stylistic innovations altered the course of modern art. .

He was always experimenting, abandoning conventional perspective and form in favour of simplified areas of pure colour, flat shapes and decorative patterns. The figure was important throughout his career despite his stylistic changes. In 1942 Matisse affirmed “the model is the source of my energy”. This exhibition contains over 100 works including sculptures, portraits and other paintings containing figures.

Henri Matisse ‘Seated Nude, Back Turned’ (1917)

Henri Matisse ‘Odalisque with Grey Trousers’ (1926 – 27)

Henri Matisse ‘The Yellow Hat’ (1929)

Henri Matisse ‘Still Life with a Sleeping Woman’ (1940)

Henri Matisse ‘Blue Interior with Two Girls’ (1947)

In the beautiful Palladian city of Vicenza for the excellent exhibition ‘Verso Monet’, which showed landscape art from the seventeenth to the early twentieth century. On display were paintings by Canaletto, Courbet, Cézanne, Manet, Renoir, van Gogh and Monet among others. The exhibition was held in the magnificent Basilica Palladiana.

Basilica Palladiana, Vicenza

Gustave Courbet ‘Waves’ (1869)

Paul Cézanne ‘Mont Sainte-Victoire’ (1885 – 87)

Claude Monet ”The Sheltered Path’ (1873)

Edouard Manet ‘Boats at Argenteuil’ (1874)

Vincent van Gogh ‘A Meadow in the Mountains’ (1889)

A beautiful warm March day in Limone sul Garda, Lombardia.

Museo d’arte Moderna e Contemporaneo di Trento e Roverto was host for exhibitions by two very different artists, El Lissitzky and Mario Radice. El Lissitzky (1890 – 1941) was an influential Russian avant garde painter and designer who helped develop Suprematism, together with his mentor Kazimir Malevich.He also developed a Suprematist style of his own, which he called Proun. His graphic design work influenced both the Bauhaus and the Constructivists. His most famous work is possibly his 1919 propaganda poster Beat the Whites with the Red Wedge. The MART exhibition included paintings, graphic design work, photographs and magazine designs.

El Lissitzky ‘The Constructor’ – self portrait (1924)

El Lissitzky ‘About two squares’ (1922)

The second artist exhibited at MART was the Italian abstract painter and architect Mario Radice (1898 – 1987). He was one of the first Italian artists to change from figurative to abstract art, much of his work then involving geometric shapes.

Mario Radice ‘La Partita di Pallone’ (1933)

Mario Radice ‘Crollo’ (1939 – 42)

Being in Rovereto for these exhibitions meant there was a great opportunity to also visit the house of the Italian Futurist artist Fortunato Depero (1892 – 1960), which holds an extensive collection of his work. Together with Giacomo Ballo, Depero wrote the Futurist manifesto Ricostruzione futurista dell’universo in 1915. Depero founded the ‘Casa d’arte futurista’ in Rovereto in 1919, which specialised in producing furniture, tapestries and toys in the Futurist style.