Fioravante Seibezzi Biography
Fioravante Seibezzi (Venice 03/11/1906 - Ivi 14/08/1974) at the age of fourteen stated "I want to learn painting". As the scholar Ugo Facco de Lagarda wrote in the Gazzettino in 1946, he put the advice of the painter Ponga into practice: "here, it's all here: copying from life, having faith, persevering in the work, never believing that what is easy is perfect. And above all, let yourself be guided by instinct." Before outlining a brief biography, attention is paid to the date of death: which one between 1974-75-76 or others? Here, as curator of the re-evaluation project of these artists, I define without a shadow of a doubt the year 1974. A date also reported by the critic Paolo Rizzi in various writings and recently re-confirmed also by my journalist colleague Fancesconi. Therefore, many documents, websites and catalogs such as "La Valigia Ieri e Oggi", "Settepittori Settemondi La Bohème di Palazzo Carminati" sensationally report the incorrect date of '76. Several even report other vintages. At the age of twelve he went to Milan where he did various jobs as a chimney sweep and labourer. During the Second World War he participated in the anti-fascist and Nazi resistance. On an artistic level, the painter Fioravante was, at the end of the 1920s, the one who revived the lagoon view in impressionist style. From a young age he was considered one of the most gifted young people belonging to the second generation of the Burano School. A vein always maintained highly lyrical, but diluted at the end of his career (as also indicated by Rizzi) in a monologue made up of multiple sandbanks with a pseudo-elliptical shape. Seibezzi was self-taught and adhered to Venice's lagoon post-impressionism. He dedicates himself to the landscape en plein air, translating that French immediacy through pure and luminous colors. His talent was discovered by Cesare Laurenti, who made the means available to him so that he could dedicate himself exclusively to painting. Seibezzi's painting style proposes a claristic landscape painting with an airy, cursive manner, sensitive to tonal variations and transparencies, expressed by rapid, light and summary brushstrokes. The art critic Alain Chivilò, agreeing with what has been indicated, points out that "the painting is always soft and delicate, never strongly chromatic. The colorist tradition of the Venetian fifteenth century is also a witness in Seibezzi within a trait that is always determined but nebulous in its entirety". Ivo Prandin also wrote in his critical analysis: “Seibezzi is of the Monet type: you can't blame him if his painting was like this (and if his cultural background was poor, like that of a disarmed city like Venice). Historical delays, after all, are always relative: Seibezzi's priority in the revival of Canaletto's landscape painting would be enough to confirm this". At an exhibition level, his debut took place at the XV Venice Biennale in 1926 where he won the "Marini Missana" prize (another recognition also received in the 1936 edition). His participation in the Biennale continued in various editions until 1956. He participated in the Rome Quadrennial (1931, 1935, 1948, 1951, 1959), while other exhibitions appeared in Venice, Padua. , Rome, Cortina d'Ampezzo, Milan, London, Auronzo di Cadore and various places in Italy and abroad.
