Traiano Chitarin

Traiano Chitarin was born in Venice in 1864. After his classical studies, he decided to devote himself exclusively to painting at around the age of twenty, attending the Accademia di Belle Arti in Venice. He made his debut at the 1887 Venice National Exhibition with Grey Morning, a painting that immediately reveals his style: the landscape, veiled by a feeling of evocation and melancholy, is modulated through notes of soft, evanescent colour.

The landscape: lyrical and evocative notes

The Venetian lagoon and mountains are interpreted by Traiano Chitarin through an elegiac meaning of the view that certainly derives from Guglielmo Ciardi’s lyrical landscape, reworked through the language of the second half of the 19th century. The painter’s contemplative and restless spirit is released through a loose and varied technique that goes through different phases. From the small, vibrant, luminous touches that he shares with the Piedmontese painters of the Rivara School and Fontanesi, he often moves on to the Divisionist technique that brings him closer to one of his favourite painters, Vittore Grubicy de Dragon.

Presence at the Venice Biennale

A regular exhibitor at the Venice Biennial, he exhibited there from 1897 to 1930, starting with a delicate melancholic verism, moving on to pieces of impeccable and emotional Divisionism and arriving at a landscape painting tinged with symbolism during the 20th century.

The titles of his paintings reflect the elegiac character of his pictorial intent, as can be seen in the first two works exhibited at the 1897 Biennale, Alpine Peace and Morning in the Mist. This was followed by Melancholy, Evening Fires and Iris from the following edition.

Sweet Solitude, Elegant Moment and The Sunset Festival appeared at the 1901 Biennale and in 1906 he was present at the Milan Exhibition for the Simplon Tunnel with three paintings, Autumn, November and Nocturne, with strong temporal overtones that brought him closer to the executional and lyrical methods of the Barbizon School, despite the fact that he was an artist of the early 20th century.

Il giorno declina appeared at the 1909 Biennale, Snow, Sunset and Mist at the 1910 Biennale. He continued to exhibit throughout the 1920s at the lagoon exhibition, always remaining firmly attached to an idea of landscape rich in poetic suggestions and personal notes, conveyed by a synthetic chromatism made up of small, delicate, luminous touches.

The lyrical sentiment is the trait d’union between the naturalist and divisionist landscapes, such as Giuliva alba al monte grappa, of the 1924 Biennale, a painting with reminiscences of Pellizzi, in which light takes on a symbolic value, as in Vespertine lights of the following Biennale.

The last work that crowned Traiano Chitarin’s career was the exhibition at the Galleria Pesaro in Milan in 1927, where his most significant works appeared, including Solitude, Winter nocturne, Forest impression, Fedaja Lake. Winter Dusk and Sunset on the Piave are exhibited at his last Biennale in 1930. He died in Venice in 1935.

Elena Lago