Emilio Pasini Biography
PASINI EMILIO (Brescia, 26 January 1872 - 4 January 1953) Emilio Pasini was born to Enrico, a scribe, and Angela Gatti, who spent his youth in the S. Alessandro district, alongside numerous brothers. Early attracted to painting, he began his apprenticeship with Campini. At just eighteen years of age he was present at art exhibitions in his family, making himself appreciated alongside well-known local artists. It was the start of numerous participations in exhibitions in Brescia, in different cities, where in the first decade of the century he proposed paintings and drawings ink also signed by Vari Pasinick, to attest to his predilection for the world he looks at with exclusive attention, trying to imitate both the layout and the colour, to the point of wanting to compete with the masters of past centuries. Some paintings, such as the Carnation Man, also feature famous authors in the title. In 1899 he was invited to the Venice Biennale: he exhibited the portrait of Marziale Ducos, while Donna d'altri tempi was welcomed by the Milanese Permanente in 1900. The following year he received the commission from the municipal council to paint the portrait of Vittorio Emanuele, placed in the main room of the municipal residence. Lady in Black established itself in 1903, and was indicated for the purchase of the University; in the same period he was commissioned to paint the Madonna of Pompeii for the church of S. Giovanni, a little further on he executed the altarpiece of S. Francesco de Sales, for the Church of Peace (1910). There are now numerous exhibitions that can testify to Emilio Pasini's success; suffice it to say of the recurring Venice Biennials, where in 1907 he exhibited Ferry-shadow of gold, a painting similar to those sent to exhibitions in Turin, Genoa, Brera... A portraitist now also known outside the confines of Brescia, long comes the list of people who addressed him: if Portrait of a Lady (exhibited in Munich in 1909) establishes the features of the painter's mother, other well-known ones follow one another, by Lida Borelli, by Luigi Barzini, by Co.- AM ( exhibited in Venice), Luigi Borghetti, (1910), The Man of the Carnation (Venice, 1912), via via Carla Visconti di Modrone (1913), Raffaello Barbera (1913), Arnaldo Cantù (circa 1914), Angela Ceresa Minotto, Bianca Prato Negroni Morosini from Zara (exhibited in Venice in the early twenties). Subsequently, Emilio Pasini, rather than participating in exhibitions, seems to prefer study work and contact with young people, so much so that, having finished teaching in public classrooms, he will gather a good number of them among himself, becoming one of the most well-known and appreciated masters. The cornplanto prof. Lorenzo Favero, who was close to the painter for years, mentions exhibitions held by Pasini also in Paris, Berlin and London, but nothing has been found to testify to his presence in those cities: worthy of note is Pasini as an art writer, revealing a profound knowledge of the history of Italian portraiture and Brescia in particular. Precisely on this topic, introduced by the illustrious Pompeo Molmenti, he held a conference at the Venetian University, on the occasion of his presence at the Lagoon Biennale (1910); and other proof of his sensitive participation are the numerous reviews written for exhibitions by students and artists. If this succinct note recalled some salient motifs in Pasini's life and work, numerous other paintings could at least be cited to prove the intense activity and resonance achieved by the portraitist. Many significant works remain with the heirs, and others still in numerous collections of city families. Like the portraits of the Baroness Laura Boccard (1900), Giovanni Tomaselli (1900), Mrs. Aloisio (1940), Monsignor Luigi Falsina (1942), the Marchesa Fracassi Mazzotti, Mr. Longhi, the co: Azzoni, Donna Franca Folcieri, Don Ermanno Gerosa, the lawyer. Grassi, Prof Alberti, many, many others already cataloged by the author of this note. Pasini, in his work, contains fifty years of events in Brescia: and not only in Brescia, through the interpretation of the faces depicted, of the environments surrounding those faces, a judgment emerges, albeit indulgent but truthful, on a generation. In his canvases we thus discover the bubbly and light aspects of an era; The Author's gaze ennobles them, directed at the highest examples of portraiture. So much so that, beyond the surfaces made of velvet, curtains, precious furnishings, the composure or expression of the figures manage to express their characters, with unusual penetration; and through the characters we go back to the world in which they lived.
