Anchise Picchi (1911-2007) - Pescatore di notte

Anchise Picchi was born in Crespina, Pisa, on April 1, 1911, to Gaetano Picchi and Isolina Cappagli. Even as a very young man he showed notable talent and a passion for drawing. At the age of five he started with the first drawings of animals and family members in charcoal on the walls of the farm where he lived, in Le Capanne, near Crespina. Around age 10, after the death of his father Gaetano near the end of World War I, the family (his mother, an elder brother, and a younger sister) moved to Fauglia, where he met Francesco and Luigi Gioli, becoming a friend of the latter, who often invited him to his studio in the turret of the villa; Picchi carved a small head in ashwood for him, and in exchange received a beautiful painting of a fair in Maremma. Then, around the mid-1920s, the family moved to Collesalvetti and in 1923/1924 he met Carlo and Luigi Servolini. He later attended a school for painters and decorators in Pisa, where he met and became very close friends with the late sculptor Alvio Vaglini. He was also friends and companions with sculptor Bertini, painter Salvatore Pizzarello, and Fortunato Bellonzi, future President of the Quadriennale of Rome. During visits to the Rigacci art shop in Florence, he met Pietro Annigoni (see: portrait in bas-relief). In 1936 the family moved again, now to Grosseto, where they resumed studies for the Diploma of Qualification to Teach Drawing and Art History. While attending the Artistic High School and the Academy of Fine Arts in Rome, he met and became friends with physicist Oreste Piccioni and with the group of Enrico Fermi. He also knew the painter Faccenda and the woodcarver Gentili, as well as the musician Alberto Montanari. In 1938 the family was again in Pisa and in the same year Anchise moved to Greece, in Thessaloniki, as an instructor in the Italian Schools Abroad. In 1941 he taught in Siena and in 1942 he was again in Collesalvetti, where he resumed his association with Luigi Gioli. In the following years he worked in the Collesalvetti studio. In 1956 he opened a studio in Livorno that he kept until the 1980s, becoming a friend of the leading members of the Labronican Group: Natali (see: wooden walnut portrait), Romiti, Filippelli, Michelozzi, Landozzi, Rontini, etc. In 1961 his mother Isolina died. In 1978 he was invited by the City of Florence to hold an artistic anthology of painting and sculpture at Palazzo Strozzi, during the month of April. In 2001 the City of Collesalvetti organized an anthology of painting and sculpture at the Villa Carmignani Exhibition Center in Collesalvetti. In 2005 the City of Crespina awarded him Honorary Citizenship and the Gold Medal for artistic merits. From the mid-1970s the artist retired permanently to his Collesalvetti studio. Curriculum vitae: In the long activity that spanned almost the entire 20th century and beyond, countless exhibitions, shows, prizes, and recognitions. It is impossible to list them all. Among the most important exhibitions, the one held in 1978, in April, at Palazzo Strozzi under the Patronage of the City of Florence. In 2001 another significant group retrospective at the Villa Carmignani Exhibition Center, sponsored by the City of Collesalvetti (Livorno). In 2004 and 2005 he was invited artist and non-competing at the Mario Borgiotti National Prize for Painting and Sculpture at the Rotonda in Livorno. In 2004 he was conferred Honorary Citizenship and the Gold Medal for artistic merits by the City of Crespina (Pisa) where the artist was born. His works are in public and private collections.

Estimate:£125.46

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