Evangelina Alciati Biography
Evangelina Gemma Alciati (Turin, 21 August 1883 – Turin, 2 January 1959) was an Italian painter. Evangelina Alciati was born in Turin on 21 August 1883 to Francesco, an engineer, and Caterina Silvia Aschieri. While still a child, she lost her father and attended the "Domenico Berti" normal school, where she had Carola Prosperi as a classmate. She did not finish her studies to enroll at the Albertina Academy, where she was a student of Giacomo Grosso and where she graduated. She was the first woman to attend the Academy, where she met Pietro Anacleto Boccalatte (1885-1970), also a painter, with whom she lived for several years and with whom she had her son Gabriele in 1907. After a long stay in Paris, where he was able to frequent the very lively and international artistic environment of the French capital, in 1907 he returned to Turin and participated in the exhibitions of the Society Promoting Fine Arts. In 1912, with his friend Emma Ciardi he successfully presented some portraits at the Venice International Exhibition. His works were purchased by the Civic Museum of Turin, whose commission was composed among others of Grosso, Ceragioli, Thovez, Canonica, who proposed purchasing the Portrait of a Little Girl for the civic collections. In 1914 she participated in the "Probitas" exhibition, an association of artists born from personalities who broke away from the Secession, such as Sartorio, Dall'Oca Bianca, Balla and others. At the time, there was also a Roman residence for Alciati, in via Villa Patrizi 12. The King purchased the Maternità for 700 lire. From then on several times Alciati participated in important Roman exhibitions and her works were frequently purchased by Roman institutions. Ugo Ojetti, then at the height of his fame as a scholar and art critic, commissioned her portraits of himself and his wife for a high sum, offering her hospitality in his Florentine villa. In 1919 Alciati participated in the Turin Promotrice with Portrait of a Man, unanimously considered by critics to be one of the few novelties in a fairly flat artistic landscape. The Ministry of Education offered her 4000 lire for the purchase: since then the work has been at the Gallery of Modern Art in Turin. At thirty-five she was fully established, a point of reference, an "abbess" as she was defined by Ferruccio Ferrazzi, with whom the painter corresponded between 1917 and 1921. Another personality of the female intellectual world of the time, Emilia Cardona, in an article in "Il Regno" in 1925, describes her as passionate about literature, a lover of the music she listens to from the theater gallery, among the ordinary public, generous, too strict with herself and her works. She is now illustrious in the artistic world, she is almost unknown in the social events that she avoids. Even artists who are now considered innovators of Turin art, such as Felice Casorati, Annibale Rigotti, Alberto Sartoris, Mario Sobrero invite her to participate in the exhibitions they organize. Emilio Zanzi admires her pastels and her flowers which are well distinguished from the many "florist painters" and well above the average level of "the puny, parlor and anachronistic art of the pastel". In 1938 his son Gabriele died during an excursion to Mont Blanc. From then on, Alciati progressively closed herself off in a private world: many portraits, many home interiors and flowers, especially in pots or cut ones. During the war she was displaced to Montà, a town in whose small horizon and in whose figures drawn from the agricultural world she sought refuge. There is a clear indication of this in the paintings of the time. After the war he returned to his home in via Santa Giulia 63 in Turin, near the Po and facing the hill, which gradually became the insistent subjects of his work. She also continued her exhibition activity in even high-level galleries, but critics consider her to be a "once celebrated" artist but now out of fashion in an artistic era undergoing profound renewal: "faithful to her own manner, to her calm naturalism, in a range of light and slightly gray shades, which vaguely, at some point, could make you think of Spadini". After a short illness he died on 2 January 1959 in his home in Turin. She was cremated and buried in Courmayeur next to her son Gabriele. His work continues to be exhibited in group shows, in public and private galleries. In 2014 a film was made about the artist's life directed by Vanni Vallino and starring Pamela Villoresi. In 2015 a monographic exhibition was dedicated to her at the Accademia Albertina.
