Franco Cannilla Biography
Franco Cannilla (1911 - 1985) Born in Caltagirone (Catania) on 13 February 1911, he died in Rome at the end of 1984. Having started towards a progressive abstraction of plastic form, since the end of the 1940s, from the 1950s he carried out a search for classic proportional harmony, also through the use of the module, in the creation of "concrete art" objects also in relation to new industrial materials. He attended the Palermo Art High School and the Palermo Academy of Fine Arts for two years. He works as a decorator and creates sculptures. Since 1940 he has lived in Rome and in 1942 he made his debut in a solo exhibition with the Sicilian painter Pippo Rizzo, exhibiting sculptures and drawings presented by PM Bardi, who defined him as one of the ten best Italian sculptors. In the mid-1940s he created sculptures, always of a classical figurative nature, such as Ballerina, Nude n. 2 of 1945, with which he presents himself at the Galleria del Secolo in Rome. In the short space of a few years he moved towards research of an abstract nature. In 1943 he participated in the first post-war Quadrennial, the IV. F. with already configured abstract research, set up a solo show in 1950 at the Galleria dello Zodiaco in Rome, presented by Alberto Savinio, proposing himself in the same year at the XXV Venice Biennale. He has been working as a "goldsmith" for some time, directly designing the models. In 1952 he took part in the international competition for the Monument to the Unknown Political Prisoner, and in the same year he was awarded a prize at the Tate Gallery in London. Nel was again present at the XXVII Venice Biennale and at the beginning of the Sixties he tended towards solutions of a constructivist nature, of perceptive solicitation, close to kinetic research. It modifies the use of materials, and also adopts those of industrial production: steel, plexiglass, etc. In 1961 Giovanni Carandente introduced it in the catalog of the solo show at the Galleria del Cavallino in Venice. And with this kinetic-constructivist work he set up a personal room at the XXXIII Biennale of '66 in Venice and in 1968 he was awarded first prize at the VI Roman Biennale. In 1981 Caltagirone dedicated an anthology to him, presented in the catalog by Filiberto Menna.
