Teodoro Wolf Ferrari

Teodoro Wolf Ferrari’s quotations

The most highly prized works on the market by Teodoro Wolf Ferrari are those of the Secession, which have estimates between 5,000 euros and 10,000 euros. Works from later years, mainly landscapes executed in Zenone degli Ezzellini, have markets in the Veneto region and are estimated between 1,500 euros and 4,000 euros.

These are approximate figures , so we recommend sending us a photo of your work by Teodoro Wolf Ferrari to get an accurate, no-obligation estimate.

Biography

Teodoro Wolf Ferrari was born in Venice in 1876 into a family of artists, his father in fact being a copyist of ancient paintings and his brother a composer. He was therefore immediately initiated into the study of painting, obtaining his first teachings from his father and then enrolling at the Academy of Fine Arts in the lagoon city. There he had as masters Pietro Fragiacomo, Guglielmo Ciardi and Millo Bortoluzzi, landscape painters specializing in light and stain painting.

Die Sholle Group, Böcklin symbolism and Nabis graphism.

Inexorably the artist moved closer to landscape painting, but in 1896 he moved to Munich, his father’s homeland, where he joined the Die Sholle Group, a wing of the Vienna Secession focused on the poetics of nature. During this period the artist broke away from the naturalism of his Venetian masters, and landscape painting was interpreted according to Arnold Böcklin’s Symbolist vision. Works such as The Mysterious Island evoke one of the Swiss artist’s most famous canvases. However, this language is filtered through Jugendstil , and his painting becomes charged with allegorical valence and a graphic line.

In 1897 he participated in the Florence Exposition with Pace (landscape with allegorical figure); and he returned there in 1899 with Diogenes and Studio (Autumn), works that also link him to the Nabis experience .

Commitment to the revaluation of the applied arts

He then returned to Italy in 1904 and became a spokesman for the German Die Sholle in the Veneto, linking up with the Ca’ Pesaro dissidents led by Nino Barbantini. He founded a movement called “L’aratro” with the aim of focusing on craftsmanship, merging painting and decoration. In fact, members of the association make not only paintings, but also stained glass, furniture, wall hangings and jewelry. Collaboration with Vittorio Zecchin on the revaluation of applied arts is strong in these years.

Between secessionist decorativism and chromatic symbolism.

Until the 1920s he demonstrates Klimtian decorative fascination in his works; in fact, at the 1912 Venice Biennale he will present Primavera, which both in title and style evokes the Secessionist Ver Sacrum. The following year he took part in the First Roman Secession with three works Sera, Mattino and Meriggio; he then participated in the next edition with Armonie. I these works color takes on the symbolic value that the graphic line had before. Several birch trees, willows and creepers with evocative and metaphorical colors also appear in his paintings.

In 1920 he moved to San Zenone degli Ezzelini, a town in the province of Treviso. It was in the Venetian city that he participated in 1921 in an exhibition with a painting entitled San Zenone degli Ezzelini and a Landscape. The following year he took part in the Spring Florentine with five works Mattino, Il Monte Grappa, Verso il Pasubio, Il Monte Tomba and Verso il Montello, works always charged with a strong sentimentality of nature and a symbolic chromatic value.

Attention to the real and the recording of chromatic and luminous variations.

In 1924 he went at the request of King Victor Emmanuel III and the Governor of Libya to the Italian colony, a period in which he would produce several fascinating views that he would then present the following year at Ca’ Pesaro, but also at the Venice Biennale in 1926 such as The Dunes of Megenin (Libya) Waiting for the Ghibli – Morning February 11, 1926 and Giama Zanzur (Libya) – Morning February 1, 1926.

From the second half of the 1920s, his painting turned more toward naturalism and Impressionist technique, increasingly immortalizing the Venetian countryside, paying attention to the real and the precise instant observed. In fact, like Impressionist research, the artist records the changing effects of light depending on the time of day, and dates begin to be part of the titles of the works as evidence of the scenery and time of day depicted. In 1930 he took part in the Venice Biennale with seven canvases including Verso il Pasubio – Morning April 6, 1928, Nubi sul Grappa and Boccaor – Morning September 16, 1929, Campagna contro sole – Afternoon March 30, 1929 and Il Piave a Nervesa – Early Morning July 9, 1926.

He continued to exhibit throughout the 1930s, then passed away in San Zenone degli Ezzelini in 1946, at age 70.

Emanuela Di Vivona