Giorgio de Chirico was an Italian artist. In the years before World War I,
he founded the scuola metafisica art movement, which profoundly influenced
the surrealists. After 1919, he became interested in traditional painting
techniques, and worked in a neoclassical or neo-Baroque style, while frequently
revisiting the metaphysical themes of his earlier work.
Life and works De Chirico was born in Volos, Greece, to
a Genoan mother and a Sicilian father. After studying art in Athens—mainly
under the guidance of the influential Greek painters Georgios Roilos and
Georgios Jakobides—and Florence, he moved to Germany in 1906, following his
father's death in 1905. He entered the Academy of Fine Arts in Munich, where he
read the writings of the philosophers Nietzsche, Arthur Schopenhauer and Otto
Weininger and also studied the works of Arnold Böcklin and Max Klinger.
He returned to Italy in the summer of 1909 and spent six months in Milan. At
the beginning of 1910, he moved to Florence where he painted the first of
his 'Metaphysical Town Square' series, The Enigma of an Autumn Afternoon, after
the revelation he felt in Piazza Santa Croce. He also painted The Enigma of the
Oracle while in Florence. In July 1911 he spent a few days in Turin on his way
to Paris. De Chirico was profoundly moved by what he called the
'metaphysical aspect' of Turin, espeically the architecture of its
archways and piazzas. De Chirico moved to Paris in July 1911, where he joined
his brother Andrea. Through his brother he met Pierre Laprade, a member of the
jury at the Salon d'Automne, where he exhibited three of his works: Enigma of
the Oracle, Enigma of an Afternoon and Self-Portrait. During 1913 he exhibited
paintings at the Salon des Indépendants and Salon d’Automne; his work was
noticed by Pablo Picasso and Guillaume Apollinaire, and he sold his first
painting, The Red Tower. In 1914, through Apollinaire, he met the art
dealer Paul Guillaume, with whom he signed a contract for his artistic
output. At the outbreak of World War I, he
returned to Italy. Upon his arrival in May 1915, he enlisted in the army, but
he was considered unfit for work and assigned to the hospital at Ferrara. He
continued to paint, and in 1918, he transferred to Rome. Starting from 1918,
his work was exhibited extensively in Europe.
De Chirico is best known for the paintings he produced between 1909 and
1919, his metaphysical period, which are characterized by haunted, brooding moods
evoked by their images. At the start of this period, his subjects were still
cityscapes inspired by the bright daylight of Mediterranean cities, but
gradually he turned his attention to studies of cluttered storerooms,
sometimes inhabited by mannequin-like hybrid figures.
In autumn, 1919, De Chirico published an article in Valori Plastici entitled "The
Return of Craftsmanship", in which he advocated a return to traditional
methods and iconography. This article heralded an abrupt change in his
artistic orientation, as he adopted a classicizing manner inspired by such old
masters as Raphael and Signorelli, and became an outspoken opponent of modern
art. In the early 1920s, the Surrealist
writer André Breton discovered one of De Chirico's metaphysical paintings on
display in Guillaume's Paris gallery, and was enthralled. Numerous young
artists who were similarly affected by De Chirico's imagery became the core of
the Paris Surrealist group centered around Breton. In 1924 De Chirico
visited Paris and was accepted into the group, although the surrealists were
severely critical of his post-metaphysical work.
De Chirico met and married his first wife, the Russian ballerina Raissa
Gurievich in 1925, and together they moved to Paris. His relationship with
the Surrealists grew increasingly contentious, as they publicly disparaged
his new work; by 1926 he had come to regard them as "cretinous and hostile".
They soon parted ways in acrimony. In 1928 he held his first exhibition in New
York City and shortly afterwards, London. He wrote essays on art and other
subjects, and in 1929 published a novel entitled Hebdomeros, the Metaphysician.
In 1930, De Chirico met his second wife, Isabella Pakszwer Far, a Russian, with
whom he would remain for the rest of his life. Together they moved to Italy in
1932, finally settling in Rome in 1944. In 1948 he bought a house near the
Spanish Steps which is now a museum dedicated to his work.
In 1939, he adopted a neo-Baroque style influenced by Rubens. De Chirico's later
paintings never received the same critical praise as did those from his
metaphysical period. He resented this, as he thought his later work was better
and more mature. He nevertheless produced backdated "self-forgeries" both
to profit from his earlier success, and as an act of revenge—retribution for the
critical preference for his early work. He also denounced many paintings
attributed to him in public and private collections as forgeries.
He remained extremely prolific even as he approached his 90th year. In 1974 he
was elected to the French Académie des Beaux-Arts. He died in Rome on 20
November 1978. His brother, Andrea de Chirico, who
became famous as Alberto Savinio, was also a writer and a painter.
Legacy De Chirico won praise for his work
almost immediately from the writer Guillaume Apollinaire, who helped to
introduce his work to the later Surrealists. De Chirico strongly
influenced the Surrealist movement: Yves Tanguy wrote how one day in 1922 he saw
one of De Chirico's paintings in an art dealer's window, and was so impressed by
it he resolved on the spot to become an artist—although he had never even held a
brush. Other Surrealists who acknowledged De Chirico's influence
include Max Ernst, Salvador Dalí, and René Magritte. Other artists as diverse
as Giorgio Morandi, Carlo Carrà, Paul Delvaux, Carel Willink, Harue Koga and
Philip Guston were influenced by De Chirico.
De Chirico's style has influenced several filmmakers, particularly in the
1950s through 1970s. The visual style of the French animated movie Le Roi et
l'oiseau, by Paul Grimault and Jacques Prévert, was influenced by de Chirico's
work, primarily via Tanguy, a friend of Prévert. The visual style of Valerio
Zurlini's film The Desert of the Tartars was influenced by De Chirico's work.
Michelangelo Antonioni, the Italian film director, also claimed to be influenced
by De Chirico. Some comparison can be made to the long takes in Antonioni's
films from the 1960s, in which the camera continues to linger on desolate
cityscapes populated by a few distant figures, or none at all, in the absence
of the film's protagonists. Writers who have appreciated De Chirico
include John Ashbery, who has called Hebdomeros "probably...the finest [major
work of Surrealist fiction]." Several of Sylvia Plath's poems are influenced by
De Chirico. In his book Blizzard of One Mark Strand included a poetic diptych
called "Two de Chiricos:" "The Philosopher's Conquest" and "The
Disquieting Muses." The box art for Fumito Ueda's
PlayStation 2 game Ico used in Japan and Europe was strongly influenced by De
Chirico. The cover art of New Order's single "Thieves Like Us" is based on de
Chirico's painting The Evil Genius of a King.
Style In the paintings of his metaphysical
period, De Chirico developed a repertoire of motifs—empty arcades,
towers, elongated shadows, mannequins, and trains among others—that he arranged
to create "images of forlornness and emptiness" that paradoxically also
convey a feeling of "power and freedom". According to Sanford Schwartz, De
Chirico—whose father was a railroad engineer—painted images that suggest
"the way you take in buildings and vistas from the perspective of a train
window. His towers, walls, and plazas seem to flash by, and you are made to
feel the power that comes from seeing things that way: you feel you know them
more intimately than the people do who live with them day by day."
In 1982, Robert Hughes wrote that De Chirico
could condense voluminous feeling through metaphor and association ... In
The Joy of Return, 1915, de Chirico's train has once more entered the city ...
a bright ball of vapor hovers directly above its smokestack. Perhaps it comes
from the train and is near us. Or possibly it is a cloud on the horizon,
lit by the sun that never penetrates the buildings, in the last electric blue
silence of dusk. It contracts the near and the far, enchanting one's sense of
space. Early de Chiricos are full of such effects. Et quid amabo nisi quod
aenigma est?—this question, inscribed by the young artist on his self-portrait in
1911, is their subtext. In this, he resembles his more
representational American contemporary, Edward Hopper: their pictures' low
sunlight, their deep and often irrational shadows, their empty walkways
and portentous silences creating an enigmatic visual poetry.
Selected works Flight of the Centauri, Enigma of an
Autumn Afternoon and Enigma of the Oracle
Ritratto di Andrea de Chirico Enigma of the Hour
The Nostalgia of the Infinite, or 1912-1913
Melanconia, The Enigma of the Arrival and La Matinée Angoissante
The Red Tower, Ariadne, The Awakening of Ariadne, The Uncertainty of the Poet, La
Statua Silenziosa, The Anxious Journey, Melancholy of a Beautiful Day, Le Rêve
Transformé, and Self-Portrait The Anguish of Departure, Portrait of
Guillaume Apollinaire, The Nostalgia of the Poet, L'Énigme de la fatalité, Gare
Montparnasse, The Song of Love, The Enigma of a Day, The Philosopher’s
Conquest, The Child's Brain, The Philosopher and the Poet, Still Life:
Turin in Spring, Piazza d’Italia, and Melancholy and Mystery of a Street
The Evil Genius of a King, The Seer, Piazza d’Italia, The Double Dream of
Spring, The Purity of a Dream, Two Sisters and The Duo
Andromache, The Melancholy of Departure, The Disquieting Muses, Metaphysical
Interior with Biscuits Metaphysical Interior with Large Factory
and The Faithful Servitor, The Great Metaphysician, Ettore e Andromaca,
Metaphysical Interior, Geometric Composition with Landscape and Factory
and Great Metaphysical Interior Metaphysical Muses and Hermetic
Melancholy Still Life with Salami and The Sacred
Fish Self-portrait
Italian Piazza, Maschere and Departure of the Argonauts
The Prodigal Son Florentine Still Life
The House with the Green Shutters The Great Machine Honolulu Museum of Art
Au Bord de la Mer, Le Grand Automate, The Terrible Games, Mannequins on the
Seashore and The Painter La Commedia e la Tragedia, The Painter’s
Family and Cupboards in a Valley L’Esprit de Domination, The Eventuality
of Destiny, Mobili nella valle and The Archaeologists
Temple et Forêt dans la Chambre Gladiatori, The Archaeologists IV, The
return of the Prodigal son I and Bagnante
I fuochi sacri 1929 Illustrations from the book Calligrammes
by Guillaume Apollinaire I Gladiatori
Milan Cathedral, 1932 Cavalos a Beira-Mar
Cavalli in Riva al Mare La Vasca di Bagni Misteriosi
The Vexations of The Thinker Self-portrait
Archeologi Illustrations from the book L’Apocalisse
Portrait of Clarice Lispector Villa Medici - Temple and Statue
Minerva Metaphysical Interior with Workshop
Fiat Piazza d’Italia
The Fall - Via Crucis Venezia, Isola di San Giorgio
Salambò su un cavallo impennato Metaphysical Interior with Biscuits
Piazza d’Italia Cornipedes,
La mia mano sinistra,, Chianciano Art Museum
Manichino Ettore e Andromaca
The Return of Ulysses, Interno Metafisico con Nudo Anatomico and
Mysterious Baths - Flight Toward the Sea Il rimorso di Oreste, La Biga
Invincibile and Solitudine della Gente di Circo
Orfeo Trovatore Stanco, Intero Metafisico and Muse with Broken Column
Metaphysical Interior with Setting Sun Sole sul cavalletto
Mobili e rocce in una stanza, La Mattina ai Bagni misteriosi, Piazza d'Italia con
Statua Equestre, La mattina ai bagni misteriosi and Ettore e Andromaca
Pianto d’amore - Ettore e Andromaca and The Sailors’ Barracks
Works about Aenigma Est – 1990 film
Giorgio de Chirico: Argonaut of the Soul – 2010 documentary film
Notes ^ His surname is traditionally written
De Chirico when it stands alone. References
Further reading Baldacci, Paolo & Fagiolo Dell’Arco,
Maurizio, Giorgio de Chirico Parigi 1924-1930, Galleria Philippe Daverio,
Milano Brandani, Edoarto, Di Genova, Giorgio,
Bonfiglioli, Patrizia, Giorgio de Chirico, catalogo dell'opera grafica
1969-1977, Edizioni Bora, Bologna Cavalesi, Maurizio, & Mori, Gioia, De
Chirico, Giunti Editore, Firenze 1988 Fagiolo Dell’Arco, Maurizio, L'opera
completa di de Chirico 1908-1924, Rizzoli, Milano 1984
Fagiolo Dell’Arco, Maurizio, Giorgio de Chirico carte, Extra Moenia Arte
Moderna, Todi Fagiolo Dell’Arco, Maurizio, & Cavallo,
Luigi, De Chirico. Disegni inediti, Edizioni grafiche Tega, Milano
Gimferrer, Pere, De Chirico, 1888-1978, opere scelte, Rizzoli, Milano
Mori, Gioia, De Chirico metafisico, Giunti, Firenze
Pontiggia, Elena, & Gazzaneo, Giovanni, Giorgio de Chirico. L’Apocalisse e la
luce, Silvana Editoriale, Cinisellobalsamo
External links Giorgio de Chirico at MoMA, biography
and image gallery Giorgio de Chirico: Metaphysical
Perspective