Giacomo Porzano Biography
Giacomo Porzano was a graphic designer and illustrator born in Lerici, La Spezia, in 1925. After obtaining his diploma, he attended Dazzi's courses at the Academy of Fine Arts in Florence. At the end of the 1940s, he joined the "Group of 7", created around the charismatic figure of Corrado Cagli. Initially, he identified with the experiences of social realism, however over time he developed an ironic and personal interpretation of them, characterized by the observation of characters and situations of the urban context and the suburbs.
Subsequently, he received the assignment of teaching in state schools, settling in Rome in the 1950s, where he associated with artists and intellectuals who introduced him to the Galleria l'Obelisco, with which he exhibited both in Rome and in the United States. During his stay in the United States, he became friends with Ben Shahn. In 1956 he participated in the VII Quadrennial of Rome, returning to exhibit later in the editions of 1965, '72 and '86.
In the mid-1960s to the early 1970s, he took up the portrait genre again and created works in which the subject became the absolute protagonist at the expense of the context. In this period, his expressionistic style took on greater evidence until arriving, in the following years, at new formal syntheses. However, the lively social feeling of reality seems to be less direct.
Porzano has also collaborated as an illustrator with the newspapers "Paese", "Paese Sera", "L'Espresso" and "Fortune Magazine". In his painting, he never betrayed his nature as a graphic designer. Porzano died in 2006.
