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Alberto Maso Gilli (1840–1891)
Born at Chieri, Turin, Gilli was a history and portrait painter, printmaker,
and sculptor. He studied painting at the Accademia Albertina, Turin,
under Andrea Gastaldi, and others including Carlos Arienti, Enrico Gamba,
and Giovanni Marghinotti. He became Gastaldi's assistant from 1865 to
1873. His drawings became popular early on in his career, and his work
on Regnault's Una decapitazione e Tangeri launched his career
as an engraver and etcher. He was appointed a superintendent at the
municipal school of drawing at Turin, and after the success of his painting,
Arnaldo da Brescia, at the Promotrice delle Belle Arti di Torino
in 1872, he became a professor of the Accademia Albertina. From 1884
until his death, he was director of La Regia Calcografia in Rome. British
art critic, Philip Gilbert Hamerton, wrote the following of Gilli: 'Alberto
Maso Gilli is an excessively skilful realist, who represents the comedy
of bourgeois existence with undeniable force, both of expression and
execution, but it is a kind of talent which, though startling for the
vivid reality of its effects, is essentially vulgar in more respects
than one. The very brilliance of the trompe Vail, so successfully aimed
at, is vulgar in itself. Every imaginable artifice is resorted to in
order to obtain a deceptive relief. Figures are set in strong lamplight
against black backgrounds till they stand out like models, and they
are shaded with a completeness that leaves nothing to the imagination.
There can be no question, however, as to the manual and technical power
with which the purpose is accomplished ; sometimes, indeed, the technical
power is so striking, that a more refined artist might well envy the
possession of it.' Gilli died at Calvi dell'Umbria, Terni.
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