Alberto MAGNELLI 1888-1971

Alberto Magnelli was born on July 1, 1888, in Florence, Italy. Self-taught, he began painting in 1907, influenced by the frescoes of Giotto and Piero della Francesca. He became involved with the Futurist movement in 1911, but quickly turned away from this path to explore abstraction. By the 1920s, he had developed a geometric and colorful style, influenced by mineral forms and materials such as marble.

Settling permanently in Paris in 1931, Magnelli actively participated in concrete art circles alongside Kandinsky and Sonia Delaunay. During World War II, taking refuge in Grasse, he produced highly original works on slate and collages. His work has been the subject of numerous international exhibitions and retrospectives, notably at the Centre Pompidou.

He died in Meudon (Paris region) on April 20, 1971. Alberto Magnelli remains one of the masters of 20th-century European abstraction, combining formal rigor and poetic sense.