Ettore Zaccari Biography
Ettore Zaccari (Cesena, 1877 – Milan, 16 May 1922) was an Italian cabinetmaker. Biography After having attended the courses of the schools for artisans of the Brera Academy and those, directed by Luigi Cavenaghi, of the School of Applied Arts of the Castello, he opened his own carving workshop in Milan in via Pisacane 32, specializing and becoming known for the production of precious and artistic frames. In Zaccari's workshop, furnishing accessories and entire furnishings were also produced whose style was based, according to a late-ecclectic taste, on medieval art (in the footsteps of what was proposed by the English Arts and Crafts movement), Renaissance, Moorish and also Byzantine of Ravenna origin, meeting the favor of the more aristocratic Milanese bourgeoisie. His works, usually in dark polished wood, although marked by the reinterpretation of "style" furniture, were close to some of the most up-to-date contemporary international experiences, such as the production of the French Maurice Dufrène, in the dense and exuberant carving decoration , often gilded or painted. In 1919 the "artist-craftsman" was involved in the "modern" style renovation of the entire furnishings of the Council Hall in the Estense Castle in Ferrara (now the Hall of Commons) together with Giovanni Battista Gianotti, owner of the Milanese "Officine d' art", and to the two masters of wrought iron Carlo Rizzarda and his partner Bernotti. Stylistic forms were adopted in the intervention which reveal a transition from liberty towards art deco, legible - as far as Zaccari is concerned - in the intertwining of naturalistic elements used in panels and frames, together with other representations which combine animal and plant subjects present in the Ferrara territory. After the carver's premature death on 16 May 1922 at just 44 years of age, his workshop continued its activity under the guidance of Mario Magnoni, introducing stylistic characteristics more similar to the deco taste, participating with its own furniture in important initiatives such as the biennials of the "International Exhibition of Decorative Arts" organized by Guido Marangoni at the Villa Reale in Monza in 1923 (in which the workshop was awarded the Diploma of Honour), 1925 and 1927.
