CUBISM/1907-1925 / Massimo Campigli, Robert Delaunay, Marcel Duchamp, Charles Dufresne, Robert de La Fresnaye, Henri Laurens, Jacques Lipchitz, Jean Metzinger, etc. ITALIAN NOVECENTO/1922-1933 / Massimo Campigli, Carlo Carrà, Felice Casoratti, Filippo De Pisis, Giorgio Morandi, Gino Severini, Mario Sironi, etc.
Max Ihlenfeld was born in Berlin (Germany) in 1895. His father was unknown. His mother emigrated quickly in Italy (Florence); he changed is birth name later, at the time of the request for Italian naturalization, and obtained a new one: Massimo Campigli. He spent most of his youth in Milan, close to Boccioni and the futuristic painters. He took part in the avant-garde newspaper “Lacerba” with his texts and drawings. Campigli painted most of his time.
Came the First World War and the young man was marked by the trench warfare. In 1919, he was sent in Paris as press correspondent; nevertheless he continued to paint, far from the market tossing. He was a time influenced by the cubism, as defined by the “purists” (Ozenfant, Corbusier). This influence was supplemented by the metaphysical painting (de Chirico, Carra, etc). With these two sphere of influence, the artist found his own style, with always in mind a painting built as a whole and in his elements.
Campigli got a difficult material life. He stayed in Paris until 1939, and took part in collective exhibitions in France and abroad. His first personal exhibition was organised in 1929 with the gallery Jeanne Bucher. Others followed (Venice, New York, etc). From the end of 20’s and in the Thirties, the artist was interested in the Cretan frescos, in Pompeii and Quattrocento one’s, in the enigmatic portraits of Fayoum, in Etruscan paintings. Through theses centres of interest, the artist set the principal components of his art. He painted mostly female characters.
In the same time to his painting, Massimo Campigli built an important work on paper: lithographs, engravings, illustrated books. In 1939, the artist carried out a large fresco for the University of Padova.
After the Second World War, the artist came back to Paris in 1948. Numerous personal exhibitions were organised in the Galerie de France. He lived in Montparnasse, was a very discrete man although he had an imposing stature, liking himself loneliness, continuing to work out, in spite of a reference to the classicism, a very particular figurative work and a singular universe.
Massimo Campigli died in 1971 in Saint-Tropez (Var, France).
Max Ihlenfeld was born in Berlin (Germany) in 1895. His father was unknown. His mother emigrated quickly in Italy (Florence); he changed is birth name later, at the time of the request for Italian naturalization, and obtained a new one: Massimo Campigli. He spent most of his youth in Milan, close to Boccioni and the futuristic painters. He took part in the avant-garde newspaper “
