Federico Zandomeneghi, Les deux glaces
The exhibition itinerary now leads us to encounter a Venetian artist of unique sensibility: Federico Zandomeneghi. As with many other Italian artists we have already encountered in the exhibition, the decisive turning point in his life coincided with his move to Paris. Here, in the heart of Montmartre, he forged deep friendships that earned him the famous nickname ‘Zandò’. Although the City of Light offered him a constant source of inspiration for cityscapes and landscapes, these remained merely occasional subjects for him: the true focus of his artistic exploration remained, inextricably, the human figure. His painted figures reveal a complete mastery of the Impressionist style, albeit reinterpreted through an intimate and personal lens. In line with the experiments taking place across the Alps, ‘Zando’ also discovered the versatility of pastels, an artistic medium that allowed him to achieve stunning vibrations of light and colour, as splendidly demonstrated by the canvas entitled Between Two Mirrors.
The artist’s definitive professional success came in 1893, thanks to his first solo exhibition organised in Paris at the gallery of the art dealer Paul Durand-Ruel. Impressed by the artist’s talent, Durand-Ruel offered him an exclusive contract: in exchange for a steady output centred on the female world, the dealer undertook to pay the models and to rent him a spacious, light-filled studio. Thus began a vast body of work. Women from the middle classes and the working classes feature in an impressive number of canvases; often these are solitary figures in the foreground, set within boldly framed compositions that heighten the sense of intimacy.