Saverio Francesco Altamura Biography
Francesco Saverio Altamura (Foggia, 5 August 1822 – Naples, 5 January 1897) was an Italian painter, writer and patriot. He was born to the Greek Sofia Perifano and Raffaele Altamura. He moved to Naples from his native Foggia, where he had studied with the Piarists, initially to attend medical school. However, he also attended evening courses at the Academy of Fine Arts, where he met Domenico Morelli, who convinced him to dedicate himself to painting. He then frequented the painter Michele De Napoli. Passionate about historical subjects, he went to Rome in 1847 after winning a competition for an artistic pension. In 1848 he fought on the barricades of Santa Brigida. Sentenced to death in absentia for his conspiracy activities against the Bourbons, he fled first to L'Aquila in 1848, then to Florence in 1850, where he came into contact with the artistic circle that gathered in the Caffè Michelangelo. In 1855 he went, together with Domenico Morelli and Serafino De Tivoli, to the Universal Exhibition in Paris, bringing back to Florence the new trends that contributed to the birth of the Macchiaioli pictorial movement, but he himself did not abandon historical subjects. In the same period he took part in the Staggia School. During his association with the Macchiaioli he painted some landscape studies. In 1860 he returned to Naples, fighting with Garibaldi's armies. He continued his political activity later: he was a city councilor in Naples. In 1861 he exhibited The Funerals of Buondelmonte at the "First National Exhibition" in Florence. In 1865 he was commissioned to fresco the chapel of the Royal Palace of Naples. He settled permanently in Naples in 1867 and continued to produce paintings, presented in various exhibitions. Among the various commissions received, in 1892 he painted five altarpieces and four tondi for the restored parish church of Castrignano de' Greci (LE). He contributed to the birth of the art gallery in the Capodimonte Museum.
