'Landscape Outside Bari' by Franco Colella, Italian Impressionist, Apulian Oil, Machiaioli

Description

Signed lower right, 'F. Colella' (Italian, nd painted circa 1950; additionally signed verso, 'Franco Colella Bari'. Framed Dimensions: 11.75 H … more Signed lower right, 'F. Colella' (Italian, nd painted circa 1950; additionally signed verso, 'Franco Colella Bari'. Framed Dimensions: 11.75 H x 18.75 W x 1.75 D Inches

Colella first studied with the Neapolitan painter Michele Galiani . He was one of the group of Apulian painters active in the first half of the 1900s, such as Michele De Giosa, Francesco Vacca, and Michele Marzulli, with whom he shared a studio.

His first public exhibition was held in 1919 in an Apulian collective and, in 1925, he held his first solo show which was favorably received by collectors. In 1946 he held his first exhibition in Rome, where he would continue to exhibit annually until the last years of his life. After his death, a retrospective exhibition of his work was held in Bari from 12 to 26 February 1982.

Colella favored a realistic style of nineteenth-century Neapolitan painting, but interpreted his subjects in a looser and more modern way. He avoided bright, chromatic effects, preferring muted colors and pastel shades that lend his work its characteristic tranquility and delicacy.

Colella exhibited widely and with success during his lifetime and his paintings may be found in the permanent collection of the Pinacoteca Metropolitana di Bari.

Reference:
Am Comanducci, Illustrated Dictionary of Modern and Contemporary Italian Painters, Designers and Engravers, IV Edition Vol. II, Luigi Patuzzi Editore Milano;
Pasquale Sorrenti, Apulian Painters, Sculptors, Architects and Craftsmen from Antiquity to the Present Day, Levante Publishers Bari, 1990; et al. less