MARINO MARINI

Biography

  • 1901

    Marino Marini is born on 27th February in Pistoia.

  • 1917

    He enrolls at the Accademia di Belle Arti in Florence, where he attends the course in Drawing and Painting and then the Special Course in Sculpture, under Domenico Trentacoste, from 1922.

  • 1928

    He exhibits for the first time at the Venice Biennale.

  • 1929

    He leaves Florence for Milan and visits Paris for the first time, where he presents People in a group show at the Galerie Bonaparte. He sends The Priest in wax to the exhibition of the ‘Novecento Italiano’ in Milan.

“To conceive a shape for me is noticing color – color vision – animosity of life – animosity of shapes. In colors I founded the beginning of every idea. Painting is placing oneself in the poetry of doing.” 

  • 1930

    He succeeds Arturo Martini as chair of sculpture at the Istituto Superiore delle Arti Applicate in Monza. He travels again to Paris and then to London. He exhibits four sculptures at the Venice Biennale: the Galleria Nazionale d’Arte Moderna in Rome purchases his Sleeping Woman.

  • 1931

    He wins third prize for sculpture at the first Quadriennale in Rome. He visits Paris again.

  • 1932

    He holds two solo shows, in Milan and in Rome, and takes part in the ‘Mostra degli Italiani a Parigi’ at the Venice Biennale. The Galleria d’Arte Moderna in Milan purchases a Bather.

  • 1933

    He executes a relief for Scalone d’Onore of the fifth Triennale in Milan and another for the ‘Mostra della Rivoluzione Fascista’ in Rome.

  • 1934

    He visits the Cathedral of Bamberg in Germany where he admires the equestrian statue of Henry II in stone, the Bamberg Rider, which he later declares will be one of the sources for his Riders.

  • 1935

    He wins first prize for sculpture (100,000lire) at the second Quadriennale in Rome. The Galleria d’Arte Moderna of Turin purchases a Boxer in bronze.

  • 1936

    He takes part in the twentieth Venice Biennale: the principal work he exhibits, a Rider in plaster, is severely criticized for its excessively archaic and primitive style.

“The horse and the knight talks about emotions in art – the knight transformes through this poetic image.” 

  • 1937

    He takes part in the Exposition Universelle in Paris at which he wins the Grand Prix for Sculpture with a Boxer in wood that enters the collections of the French State.

  • 1938

    He marries Mercedes Pedrazzini on 14 December.

  • 1939

    In December he holds an important solo exhibition at the Galleria Barbaroux in Milan where, along with a large number of portraits, he again presents his Rider in plaster, previously shown at the 1936 Venice Biennale, as well as The Pilgrim, a new, large-scale Rider. Italy’s more discriminating art collectors become interested in his work.

  • 1940

    He exhibits his work again at the Venice Biennale: his Bacchus in stone would be purchased soon after by the Kunsthaus Zurich. He makes the Pomona with her arms behind her back, the plaster of which is purchased by Emilio Jesi.

  • 1941

    In February he is named ‘per chiara fama’ professor of sculpture at the Accademia Albertina in Turin. In June he transfers to the Accademia di Brera, Milan.

  • 1942

    In December, after bombing in Milan causes the loss of many of his works, he goes to live with his wife in Tenero, near Locarno, Switzerland.

  • 1943

    He frequents sculptors Alberto Giacometti, Fritz Wotruba, Germaine Richier and Hermann Haller.

  • 1944

    The work he carries out in the two years 1943-1944 become the content of a monograph with an introduction by the philologist Gianfranco Contini. In October he takes part in an exhibition with Arnold D’Altri, Richier and Wotruba at the Kunstmuseum Basel: Swiss critics include him among the exponents of international sculptural expressionism.

  • 1945

    The exhibition of the four sculptors travels to the Kunsthalle Bern. Marini holds solo shows in Basel and Zurich of the works made in his years in Switzerland. He initiates a series of medium-sized Riders, destined for international success.

  • 1946

    He returns to Milan in the spring, and lives in a house in Piazza Mirabello, where he also has his studio. He starts teaching again at the Accademia di Brera.

  • 1948

    He takes part in the Venice Biennale, with a solo room of his work, and is a member of the Commission for Figurative Art. He meets the American gallerist Curt Valentin, who includes his work in a group exhibition, ‘Modern International Sculpture,’ at the Buchholz Gallery in New York in September.

  • 1949

    He takes part in the exhibition ‘XXth Century Italian Art’ organized at the Museum of Modern Art in New York by Luigi Toninelli. He meets Peggy Guggenheim, who purchases a Rider in plaster and has it cast in bronze before placing it, with the title The Angel of the City, in her Ca’ Venier dei Leoni house-museum in Venice.

“Lead the way for young people, give them a long way, give them a sun that offends their eyes. By closing them they will receive imagination.”

  • 1950

    From February to March he visits for the first time the United States, where Curt Valentin organizes his first American solo show at the Buchholz Gallery in New York, marking the start of his international success. He makes the first version of his Portrait of Igor Stravinsky. Edgar J. Kaufmann, owner of Frank Lloyd Wright’s Falling Water, purchases a version of The Angel of the City.

  • 1951

    He exhibits for the first time in England, at Erica Brausen’s Hanover Gallery and at the ‘Open Air Sculpture Exhibition’ in Battersea Park.

  • 1952

    He wins the Grand Prix for Sculpture at the Venice Biennale, where he is present with a solo show: the controversy that arises around his work led the Comune of Milan to decide against the purchase of The Large Horse, which is bought instead by the Museum of Stockholm. This opens up new exhibition opportunities in Göteborg, Copenhagen and Oslo, where he holds solo shows the following year. He exhibits with Henry Moore and Wotruba at the Galerie Welz in Salzburg.

  • 1953

    He purchases land at Forte dei Marmi, where La Germinaia, which was to become his favorite residence, was later built.

  • 1954

    The Accademia Nazionale dei Lincei awards Marini the International Feltrinelli Prize for Sculpture. Curt Valentin dies at La Germinaia. Pierre Matisse becomes his New York dealer.

  • 1955

    He receives from The Hague the commission for a monument to be placed in a new quarter of the city, which would be inaugurated in 1959. At the time of his solo exhibition at the Boijmans van Beuningen Museum in Rotterdam, the city purchases a version of the Large Miracle of 1952 for a monument to the victims of Nazism.

  • 1958

    Brausen includes his work in a group show at the Hanover Gallery, London, with Giacometti, Henri Matisse and Moore. The modern museum in Munich purchases a Large Miracle for its collections. Palma Bucarelli dedicates a room to him in the newly installed Galleria Nazionale d’Arte Contemporanea in the Valle Giulia in Rome.

  • 1960

    The Germanisches National museum in Nuremberg purchases a Large Warrior. The Kunsthaus Zurich dedicates an important retrospective show to him.

  • 1962

    He executes a portrait of Moore at La Germinaia. Siegfried Rosengart, the Swiss art dealer, commissions him to travel to St Paul-de-Vence to make a portrait of Marc Chagall, which is declined as it was considered offensively caricatural. He takes part in the exhibition ‘Sculture nella città,’ organized in Spoleto for the Festival of Two Worlds.

  • 1963

    The Galleria Toninelli in Milan organizes his first solo show of paintings. He exhibits at the Kunsthalle Basel with Alexander Calder and Jean Arp. He makes a portrait of Arp in the same year.

  • 1966

    His first retrospective exhibition in Italy takes place in the PalazzoVenezia in Rome.

  • 1967

    He is commissioned to make a portrait of Mies van der Rohe, which requires him to travel to Berlin, where the architect is working on his project for the Nationalgalerie.

  • 1972

    A large exhibition of portraits titled ‘Personaggi del XX secolo’ takes place at the Centro Studi ‘Piero della Francesca’ in Milan. On this occasion he is given the honorary citizenship of the city. He donates a large number of works that are installed as the Museo Marino Marini in the Galleria Comunale d’Arte Moderna of Milan. At the request of Paolo Grassi, Superintendent of the Teatro La Scala, he designs sets and costumes for the Rite of Spring by Stravinsky.

  • 1973

    Gianni Agnelli purchases the Miracle in stone of 1970 and donates it to the Vatican for its Museo d’Arte Contemporanea. The Rider in wood of 1936 from the Battiato collection is donated to the same museum.

  • 1974

    A version of the mutilated Pomona of 1940 is placed in the Sala dei Buontalenti of the Galleria degli Uffizi on 29 April, at the behest of Luciano Berti, director, and with the support of Nello Bemporad, Superintendent, and Luciano Bausi, Mayor of Florence.

  • 1976

    The Staatsgalerie Moderner Kunst in Munich dedicates a permanent room of sculpture and paintings to Marini.

  • 1978

    A traveling exhibition of sculpture and paintings is organized in museums in Japan. Marini donates a Rider in bronze to the Musée d’Art Moderne in Paris.

  • 1979

    The Centro di Documentazione of the work of Marino Marini is inaugurated in Pistoia.

  • 1980

    The donation that enables the founding of the Museo Marino Marini in Florence is confirmed in the spring, a few months before Marini’s death in August.

  • 1983

    The Fondazione Marino Marini is established in Pistoia.

  • 1988

    The Museo Marino Marini is inaugurated in the former Church of San Pancrazio in Florence.