Mario Menin Biography
He was born in Padua on 9 December 1896 to Luigi and Pasqua Rinaldi. He studied at the art institute of his city, where he taught after graduating in Venice. We can trace a lament over the dead Christ to this period, painted with strong archaic tones. Called up on 27 Nov. 1915, in December he was transferred to Rome. During the same year, at the artillery detachment in Bracciano, he had his first meeting with Filippo Tommaso Marinetti, who bought one of his drawings for 28 lire. Subsequently he was in a war zone; he was discharged on 15 December 1919. Two works can be dated to the second half of the 1920s in which Menin portrayed his mother and sisters, evoking suspended atmospheres, using stylistic solutions deriving from the magical realism of Felice Casorati. On 10 February 1930 he moved to Rome. Enlisted on 17 August 1935 as a volunteer in the "28 October" division headed to Ethiopia, upon his arrival in East Africa he met Marinetti again, with whom he formed a partnership that lasted until the latter's death. At the poet's suggestion, in 1936 he sketched and painted his best-known works in the field: large-scale battle scenes in bright tones, animated by force lines, such as Uarieu Combat Experienced by the Futurist Menin Black Shirt and Uorc Amba Combat Experienced by the Shirt black futurist Menin of 28 October (both in Milan, private collection), or Autocarrette nel Tembien (Rome, National Gallery of Modern Art), composed of profound chiaroscuro contrasts. At the same time he expressed interest in the Ethiopian landscape in works with a compendium style such as Amba Carnalè: Uarieu pass (formerly Rome, African Museum: this and the previous one are reproduced in Margozzi, 2005) and depicted episodes of military life in works of inspiration nature style documentary. Driven by sincere enthusiasm for M.'s war compositions, Marinetti personally brought the rolls of his paintings on the return trip to Italy to present them in the pavilion of Italian futurism at the XX Venice Biennale in 1936. On this occasion B. Mussolini purchased Combattimento Debrambà (Milan, private collection). In the same year some of the paintings already exhibited and others of a similar nature were included in the II National Exhibition of Mural Plastics in Rome.
