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Gottardo Piazzoni

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Gottardo Piazzoni
Portrait of Gottardo in his San Francisco studio, ca. 1925
Born
Gottardo Fidele Piazzoni

(1872-04-14)April 14, 1872
Intragna, Ticino, Switzerland
DiedAugust 1, 1945(1945-08-01) (aged 73)
EducationSan Francisco Art Institute
SpouseBeatrice Delmue

Gottardo Fidele Piazzoni (April 14, 1872 – August 1, 1945) was a Swiss-born American landscape painter, muralist and sculptor of Italian heritage, a key member of the school of Northern California artists in the early 1900s.

Early life

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Piazzoni was born on April 14, 1872, in Intragna, Ticino, Switzerland.[1] He moved at the age of 15 to his father's dairy farm in the Carmel Valley. His uncle Luigi Piazzoni, had the Luigi Piazzoni ranch adjacent to his father's ranch.[2][3][4] After training with Arthur Frank Mathews at the Mark Hopkins Institute of Art (later the San Francisco Art Institute),[5] Piazzoni trained for three years in Paris at the Académie Julian and under Jean-Léon Gérôme.[4] He then returned to California to begin his career and set up his own teaching studio.

Specializing in landscapes in a muted palette, most scholars count Piazzoni among the Tonalists,[6] and was one of the most influential exponents of this style in California.[7] He sought out the lighting effects of certain times of day, taking a "special interest in full moonrises, the viewing of which became a family ritual. Venturing up a hill, the family would cheer the appearance of the moon. Piazzoni knew the exact time for each moonrise and kept precise records."[8] He was able to portray the essential qualities of a scene and achieve a strong mood, using only minimal descriptive details.[7]

Silence by Gottardo Fidele Piazzoni, c. 1912, oil on panel, De Young Museum

Piazzoni's best-known public work may be his 14 murals for the former headquarters of the San Francisco Public Library for architect George W. Kelham, ten of them dating from 1932, the other four painted in 1945 and not installed until the 1970s.[9] After public debate and lawsuits in the late 1990s, the ten principal murals can now be seen at the M. H. de Young Memorial Museum.

By early 1901 Piazzoni was sharing a studio with fellow painter Xavier Martínez, with whom he founded a year later the short-lived California Society of Artists.[10] He was also a co-founder of the California Society of Etchers in 1912, with Robert B. Harshe, art professor at Stanford University;[11] Pedro Joseph de Lemos, professor at San Francisco Art Institute;[12] and Ralph Stackpole, sculptor, printmaker, and at that time Piazzoni's studio assistant. He enthusiastically advanced the career of sculptor Arthur Putnam. He was also a member of the Bohemian Club, exhibited with the Berkeley and Monterey art colonies, taught at the San Francisco Art Institute,[13] and served on the jury and advisory committee of the Art Gallery at the Hotel Del Monte.[10] In 1927 he publicly protested when the directors of the municipal Oakland Art Gallery threatened to remove two displayed paintings of “explicit female nudes.”[14]

Piazzoni was also a good friend of Impressionist Granville Redmond and introduced the deaf-mute artist to Charlie Chaplin. The relationship of Redmond, Chaplin and Piazzoni is explored in a play by Steve Hauk, "The Floating Hat," published by the Traditional Fine Art Organization, Inc. The play is also in the collection of the Gallaudet University library.

Among his students were George Post, Rinaldo Cuneo, Dorr Bothwell, and Clayton Sumner Price. American landscape painter Mireille Piazzoni Wood was Piazzoni's daughter, painter-writer Philip Wood his son-in-law. Artists Thomas Wood and Russell Chatham are Piazzoni grandsons.

Death

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Piazzoni died on August 1, 1945, at the Piazzoni ranch home in Carmel Valley. Services were held in San Francisco.[15] Piazzoni was buried at the Cypress Lawn Memorial Park cemetery, in Colma, California.

Works

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  • Paris (1900)
  • Homes by the water (1901)
  • Evening prayer (1901)
  • My Sketch Class at Tiburon (1902)
  • A bit of La Jolla's Bay (1903)
  • Shore and Sea (1904)
  • Landscape with a fisherman in a row boat (1906)
  • Ile de la Jatte (1907)
  • The Oaks (1909)
  • Marin Hills (1910)
  • Near Sausalito (1910)
  • Mill Valley (1911)
  • Silence (1912)
  • Two trees (1912)
  • Spring Hills & Clouds (1912)
  • Boat near Beach (1913)
  • Bather in a Stream with Hills Beyond (1914)
  • Marin Hills from Exposition (1915)
  • The Land (1915)
  • The Sea (1915)
  • Rolling Hills (1916)
  • Tiburon (1916)
  • Moon over Houseboat 1917)
  • Clear Sky Over a Farm (1917)
  • Tiburon (1917)
  • Bridge in a landscape (1918)
  • Cloud Over Dark Hills (1919)
  • Stand of trees (1920)
  • House in a landscape (1921)
  • Trees in a summer landscape (1922)
  • Pines (1924)
  • The Soil (1925)
  • Piazzoni Ranch (1926)
  • Rolling hills and Forest Knolls (1927)
  • Golden hills and shadows (1928)
  • Coastal bluffs along a shore (1929)
  • Carmel Valley landscape (1930)
  • Piazzoni Ranch (1931)

Murals

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The Land by Gottardo F. P. Piazzoni, 1932, oil on canvas, five panels, 12 x 6 2/3 ft. each, De Young Museum
The Sea by Gottardo F. P. Piazzoni, 1931, oil on canvas, five panels, 12 x 6 2/3 ft. each, De Young Museum

References

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  1. ^ Young, Kerri (2021-09-02). "Heritage 50: Asian Art Museum Moves into the Main and the Fight for the Piazzoni murals". San Francisco Heritage. Retrieved 2024-02-06.
  2. ^ Jan Holloway (June 26, 2005). "The Piazzoni Legacy, Three Generations Paint the Splendors of California". Bolinas Museum. Retrieved 2023-01-16.
  3. ^ Chatham, Russell (1990). Russell Chatham: One Hundred Paintings. Livingston, Montana. Retrieved 2023-01-16. {{cite book}}: |work= ignored (help)CS1 maint: location missing publisher (link)
  4. ^ a b Neff, Emily Ballew. The Modern West: American Landscapes, 1890-1950, Yale University Press, 2006, p. 108.
  5. ^ Sunset, Volume 21 By Southern Pacific Company. Passenger Dept, 1908, page 738
  6. ^ On the Edge of America: California Modernist Art, 1900-1950; by Paul J. Karlstrom, 1996, p. 99
  7. ^ a b Bockhorst, Paul (1996). "Preface". Impressions of California: Early currents in art 1850-1930. The Irvine Museum. p. 15. ISBN 0-9635-468-8-0.
  8. ^ Twilight and Reverie: California Tonalist Painting 1890-1930, Harvey L. Jones, 1995, accessed at http://www.tfaoi.com/aa/2aa/2aa594.htm
  9. ^ "THE NEW DE YOUNG / Controversy over, Piazzoni murals settle into de Young's landscape". 27 June 2005.
  10. ^ a b Edwards, Robert W. (2012). Jennie V. Cannon: The Untold History of the Carmel and Berkeley Art Colonies, Vol. 1. Oakland, Calif.: East Bay Heritage Project. pp. 46, 94, 188, 196, 200, 207, 217, 252, 306, 372, 443–445, 493, 541, 543, 577–578, 580–582, 690. ISBN 9781467545679. An online facsimile of the entire text of Vol. 1 is posted on the Traditional Fine Arts Organization website ("Jennie V. Cannon: The Untold History of the Carmel and Berkeley Art Colonies, vol. One, East Bay Heritage Project, Oakland, 2012; by Robert W. Edwards". Archived from the original on 2016-04-29. Retrieved 2016-06-07.).
  11. ^ "Robert Harshe Papers". Ryerson and Burnham Libraries: The Art Institute of Chicago. Archived from the original on 2011-05-22. Retrieved 2011-05-21.
  12. ^ Young, Kerri (2021-09-02). "Heritage 50: Asian Art Museum Moves into the Main and the Fight for the Piazzoni murals". San Francisco Heritage. Retrieved 2024-02-06.
  13. ^ Young, Kerri (2021-09-02). "Heritage 50: Asian Art Museum Moves into the Main and the Fight for the Piazzoni murals". San Francisco Heritage. Retrieved 2024-02-06.
  14. ^ The Oakland Tribune, 9 February 1927, p. 1.
  15. ^ "G. Piazzoni Passes Away". The Californian. Salinas, California. August 2, 1945. Retrieved 2023-01-16.
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