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Biography
Giorgio
De Chirico
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Biography
of Giorgio De Chirico
Giorgio
De Chirico was born on 10th July 1888 in Volos, the capital of
Thessaly (Greece). His father Evaristo was an engineer and his
mother, Gemma Cervetto, a noblewoman of Genoese origin. Two
years later in Athens, his brother Andrea was born. Andrea
adopted the pseudonym of Alberto Savinio in his work as a writer
and musician.
During this time Giorgio, whose father always supported his
passion for art, took his first drawing lessons with the Greek
painter Mavrudis. And it was in Athens that De Chirico realized
his first painting, entitled "Still Life with Lemons
(Natura morta con limoni)". In 1906, following the death of
his father, the De Chirico family moved to Germany where Giorgio
attended the Academy of Fine Arts and came into contact with
German artistic, literary and philosophical culture. He read
Schopenauer, Nietzsche and Weininger, continued studying the
Ancients and studied the art of Arnold Böcklin. In 1908 he
returned to Italy and was reunited with his family; in 1910 he
moved to Florence and was influenced by Giotto and primitive
Tuscan painting, concentrating on a style rich in perspective
layouts and constructions with arches. It was in this way that
one of his first metaphysical paintings was born: "Enigma
of an Autumn Afternoon (Enigma di un pomeriggio
d’Autunno)". In the summer of 1911, with his mother and
his brother Alberto, he travelled to Paris where his real
artistic career began, in contact with the French
artistic-cultural avant-garde circles and later with the poet
Guillaume Apollinaire. In the same year, thanks to help from his
brother, he met Pierre Laprade, member of the jury at the Salon
d’Automne, for which he exhibited three works: "Enigma of
the Oracle (Enigma dell’Oracolo)", "Enigma of an
Afternoon (Enigma di un pomeriggio)" and "Self-Portrait
(Autoritratto)". When another three of this works were
exhibited in 1913 at the Salon des Indépendants in Paris he was
noticed by Pablo Picasso and Guillaume Apollinaire, thanks to
whom De Chirico became friends with Brancusi, Braque, Jacob,
Soffici, Léger and Derain. In the autumn of the same year
Apollinaire organised an exhibition of thirty works by the
artist in his studio and wrote a review of De Chirico in
"L'intransigeant" using the term "metaphysic".
Magazines and newspapers published his works and praised his
creative qualities. The First World War broke out and the two
brothers returned to Italy. Giorgio was assigned to the hospital
in Ferrara where he had a sedentary job since he was considered
unfit to work. He continued to maintain close ties with the
Parisian milieu and came into contact with the Dada movement. In
1916 he painted his famous "Hector and Andromache (Ettore e
Andromaca)" and "The Disturbing Muses (Le Muse
inquietanti)" and frequented Ferrara's artistic milieu: he
met Filippo De Pisis and began corresponding with Carrà, whom
he was to meet during a stay in military hospital. Carrà was
fascinated by De Chirico's poetic world and artistic themes and
painted a series of works with clear metaphysical foundations.
"Metaphysical painting" was born, theorized a little
later in the magazine "Valori Plastici". In 1918 De
Chirico obtained a transfer to Rome. There, he worked with the
above-mentioned magazine and exhibited in the rooms of the
newspaper "Epoca" together with Prampolini, Carrà and
Soffici. In 1919 he presented his first personal exhibition at
Anton Giulio Bragaglia's Art Gallery and published the text
"We metaphysicists". That moment marked the
beginning for De Chirico of an intense period of exhibitions
throughout Europe, particularly in France, while considerable
interest in his works also emerged in the United States. De
Chirico's painting was appreciated by all the major Dadaist and
Surrealist artists and also by the German artists of "Magic
Realism", those of the "Bauhaus" and of the
"New Objectivity". In 1925 he married the Russian
dancer Raissa Gurievich Kroll. In 1928 he held his first one man
exhibition in New York at the Valentine Gallery and shortly
afterwards exhibited in London. He published the novel "Hebdòmeros"
in 1929. Indeed, in those years, as well as painting, he
dedicated himself to writing and also to stage designing for
theatrical shows and ballets. He continued to exhibit in the
most important art galleries both in Europe and America and met
Isabella Far, who was to become his second wife in 1952. A few
months after his ninetieth birthday, on 20th November 1978,
Giorgio De Chirico died in Rome. His remains are conserved in
the Monumental Church of St. Francis at Ripa, in Rome.
From
the catalogue "Omaggio a De Chirico"
published by the Fondazione Art Museo
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