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Lot Essay
Renowned for his intensely meditative, near-abstract still-life paintings, Giorgio Morandi also had a close affinity for the landscape genre, and he extensively depicted his surroundings both from the window of his apartment in Bologna and at Grizzana, a small rural village in the Apennines beloved by the artist, to which he returned regularly. Here, Morandi painted the countryside from a host of viewpoints, at different times of the day, capturing expansive vistas of fields and vineyards or depicting tightly cropped scenes of gardens, buildings or farmhouses, such as the present work. What unites his depictions of Grizzana is the haunting absence of figures or human presence, which lend works such as Paesaggio a sense of stillness and contemplative silence. Painted in 1933-1934, Paesaggio encapsulates Morandi’s distinctive approach to this subject, creating, as in his still-lifes, a painting that is timeless and harmonious, transcending the specifics of its location to become a composition defined by colour harmonies and tonal contrasts.
Like in his still-life compositions, Morandi's landscapes did not seek to transcribe the scene in front of him, but to capture its essence in painterly form. Featuring a rich, terracotta-roofed building nestled into the soft green vegetation surrounding it, the simplified and unembellished scene depicted in the present work reveals the influence of a range of past masters, most notably Paul Cézanne. Indeed, it is in his landscapes that Morandi’s lifelong admiration for Cézanne is most visible. Cézanne’s work greatly inspired Morandi throughout his career; the artist stated that his ‘favourite artist, when I first began to paint, was actually Cézanne’ (Morandi, quoted in E. Roditi, ‘Giorgio Morandi’ in Giorgio Morandi: esposición antológica, exh. cat., Madrid, 1999, p. 324). Indeed, he was very familiar with many of Cézanne’s landscapes and is said to have loved La Montagne Sainte-Victoire au grand pin of 1887, which was reproduced in several books and magazines in Italy in the 1920s and 30s. Like the Master of Aix, in Paesaggio, Morandi has scrutinised the inherent structure of the landscape, its forms and colours, transcribing these onto the canvas with flattened forms of colour. Unlike Cézanne however, the present work is painted with luscious, thick brushstrokes, which remain visible in places. Though a different technique to Cézanne’s meticulously applied ‘constructive’ brushstrokes, the result remains the same: nature is endowed with a solidity and tangibility, turned into a formal artifice. Like the indelible association that the Mont Sainte-Victoire in Provence has with Cézanne, the landscape of Grizzana has since become resolutely connected to Morandi, so much so that the town is now known as Grizzana Morandi.
Like in his still-life compositions, Morandi's landscapes did not seek to transcribe the scene in front of him, but to capture its essence in painterly form. Featuring a rich, terracotta-roofed building nestled into the soft green vegetation surrounding it, the simplified and unembellished scene depicted in the present work reveals the influence of a range of past masters, most notably Paul Cézanne. Indeed, it is in his landscapes that Morandi’s lifelong admiration for Cézanne is most visible. Cézanne’s work greatly inspired Morandi throughout his career; the artist stated that his ‘favourite artist, when I first began to paint, was actually Cézanne’ (Morandi, quoted in E. Roditi, ‘Giorgio Morandi’ in Giorgio Morandi: esposición antológica, exh. cat., Madrid, 1999, p. 324). Indeed, he was very familiar with many of Cézanne’s landscapes and is said to have loved La Montagne Sainte-Victoire au grand pin of 1887, which was reproduced in several books and magazines in Italy in the 1920s and 30s. Like the Master of Aix, in Paesaggio, Morandi has scrutinised the inherent structure of the landscape, its forms and colours, transcribing these onto the canvas with flattened forms of colour. Unlike Cézanne however, the present work is painted with luscious, thick brushstrokes, which remain visible in places. Though a different technique to Cézanne’s meticulously applied ‘constructive’ brushstrokes, the result remains the same: nature is endowed with a solidity and tangibility, turned into a formal artifice. Like the indelible association that the Mont Sainte-Victoire in Provence has with Cézanne, the landscape of Grizzana has since become resolutely connected to Morandi, so much so that the town is now known as Grizzana Morandi.