234 - Luigi Serena (1855–1911)

Luigi Serena (1855–1911) Female Figure, ca. 1898–1900 Oil on cardboard 78.5 x 34.5 cm Signature: “LS” on the front Distinctive features: on the reverse, a Veneto Banca label with inventory references Provenance: Galleria d’Arte Martinazzo, Montebelluna; Veneto Banca SpA in LCA Certificates: Photocertificate and critical report by Ottorino Stefani dated March 6, 1999 Condition. Support: 95% Condition. Surface: 95% For direct WhatsApp assistance before and during the live auction: +39 346 12 999 80 // Direct assistance via WhatsApp before and during the auction: +39 346 12 999 80 Luigi Serena, the painter of choice for the Treviso bourgeoisie at the turn of the 19th and 20th centuries, had no direct students, but he was admired by younger artists for his bohemian and anti-bourgeois spirit—and as a moral compass—becoming a cornerstone of the Marca’s artistic landscape. It was the avant-garde artists, led by Arturo Martini, who organized Serena’s posthumous exhibition shortly after his death in 1911. Although he worked primarily in the province, the artist successfully participated in the most important exhibitions of the time: in Venice (1881), Milan (1883), Turin (1884), Florence (1886), Paris (1888), and Munich (1890). She was among those invited to the 1897 Venice Biennale (Eugenio Manzato, “Treviso,” in *La Pittura in Italia. L’Ottocento*, Milan, 1990, p. 213). At the turn of the century, Serena’s interest in nature and the effects of light grew. As Ottorino Stefani aptly writes, the “realist painter cannot even compete, so to speak, with photography, especially when, like Serena, he uses substantial layers of paint to depict areas in light (and in this respect his technique differs from that employed by most professional painters). Therefore, Serena must have executed his “trilogy of light” with an unusually unspoiled emotional engagement, as if he had discovered, for the first time, the extraordinary capacity of light to create the painting on its own. The beloved figures are set apart in a zone of meditative silence. They live as creatures of the vast natural world: defenseless beings, akin to trees, flowers, objects, and animals enveloped in the cool torpor of transparent, clear shadows” (Ottorino Stefani, ed., “Luigi Serena. 1855–1911,” Ponzano Veneto, 2006, p. 107). In these paintings, “existence finds a moment of respite and tenderness. Thus, nature, once again, becomes an inexhaustible source of direct inspiration, almost a faithful mirror of the soul’s inner emotions” (ibid., p. 109). The work up for auction is dated by Ottorino Stefani, in the certification note, to around 1900, noting its unusual and highly original execution “which may recall the great tradition of the French Impressionists, but which manages to create a style typical of Serena; a style that blends Venetian influences with a more substantial and sensual Trevisan painting style.”