Anselmo Bucci (1887 – 1955). The Twentieth Century Between Italy and Europe

Mart di Rovereto presents the most extensive retrospective ever dedicated to Anselmo Bucci. Through more than 150 works, the exhibition sheds light on one of the most complex, erudite and independent figures of the twentieth century.

Anselmo Bucci, Juliette, detail

For a long time relegated to a peripheral position in relation to the leading names of Italian art in the first half of the twentieth century, Bucci’s work is finally being repositioned within its distinctly European historical and cultural context.

The retrospective highlights the pivotal role the artist played in the transition from nineteenth-century figurative tradition to the experiments of the new century, presenting audiences and critics alike with one of the most complex, erudite, and independent figures of the twentieth century.

A painter, printmaker, draughtsman, and writer, Bucci occupies a singular place in the artistic landscape of his time. A key figure in the cultural life between Paris and Milan, he always retained a strong intellectual autonomy, reflected in his ambiguous relationship with the Novecento Italiano group, which he helped found and to which he gave its name, only to later distance himself from it.

His work moves across languages, techniques, and genres with rare freedom, while preserving an internal coherence grounded in a profound visual culture and a deep literary sensibility, both shaped by his direct experience of urban modernity and of the First World War, which he lived on the front line as a war artist.

The exhibition includes loans from major private and public collections, including the Quadreria Cesarini – Casa Museo di Fossombrone, the Musei Civici di Monza, the Museo del Novecento in Milan, the Galleria Nazionale d’Arte Moderna e Contemporanea in Rome, and the Istituto Centrale per la Storia del Risorgimento Italiano.