"Italy's Divisionist Painters 1891-1910" @ The National Gallery, London.

20 juin 2008

"Italy's Divisionist Painters 1891-1910" @ The National Gallery, London.

Emilio Longoni (1859-1932), Glacier, 1906, Private collection © Photo Courtesy of the owner

Giovanni Segantini (1858-1899), Spring in the Alps, 1897, French & Company, New York © Photo Courtesy of the owner

This exhibition explores the complex relationship between Italian Divisionism and the emerging Futurist movement in the early years of the 20th century. It is the first of its kind to be organised outside Italy.

Angelo Morbelli (1853-1919), In the Rice Fields, 1898-1901, Private collection © Photo Courtesy of the owner

Giuseppe Pellizza da Volpedo (1868-1907), The Living Torrent, 1895-6, Pinacoteca di Brera, Milan (Sprind gift, 1986) © Su concessione del Ministero per i Beni e le Attività Culturali

Centred in Milan, Divisionism was arguably the most significant art movement to emerge in Italy during the last decades of the 19th century.

Angelo Morbelli (1853-1919), Holiday at the Pio Albergo Trivulzio, 1892, Musée d'Orsay, Paris (RF1192) © RMN, Paris

Gaetano Previati (1852-1920), The Dream, 1910, Private collection © Photo Courtesy of the owner

Dissatisfaction with modern civilization led Divisionist painters to explore Symbolism. Their aim was to represent political concerns and make their art into an instrument for social change.

Giuseppe Pellizza da Volpedo (1868-1907), The Dead Child, 1896-1905, Musée d'Orsay, Paris (Palais de Tokyo, since 1977) (RF1977-281) © RMN, Paris. Photo Hervé Lewandowski

Luigi Russolo (1885-1947), Lightning, 1909-10 © Galleria Nazionale d'Arte Moderna, Rome. Photo Alessandro Vasari

The movement also sprang from research into optics and the physics of light. Inspired by French developments with pointillism, and fuelled by a desire to increase the luminosity and brilliance of their paintings, artists developed new techniques applying paint in a variety of dots and strokes.

Emilio Longoni (1859-1932), Alone!, 1900 © Casa di Lavoro e Patronato per i Ciechi di Guerra di Lombardia, Milan

Emilio Longoni (1859-1932). 'Reflections of a Hungry Man or Social Contrasts', 1894. © Museo del territorio Biellese, Biella.

Umberto Boccioni (1882-1916), Lombard Countryside , 1908 © Museo Civico di Belle Arti, Lugano (2258)

This exhibition features around 60 paintings, including works by the main protagonists of Divisionism: Vittore Grubicy de Dragon, Giovanni Segantini and Gaetano Previati. It will also display works by the Futurist artists Giacomo Balla, Umberto Boccioni and Carlo Carrà.

Angelo Morbelli (1853-1919), Twilight, 1894-6 © Civica Galleria d'Arte Moderna, Verona

Vittore Grubicy de Dragon (1851-1920). 'Morning', 1897, Musée d'Orsay, Paris (RF1977-426) © RMN, Paris. Photo Hervé Lewandowski.

Radical Light is a unique opportunity to explore a lesser-known, yet undoubtedly important movement, offering a link to the National Gallery’s great historical collections of Italian art.

Italy's Divisionist Painters 1891-1910, 18 June - 7 September 2008, The National Gallery, London.