The history of a private collection is linked to the history of the person who created it. It is colored with the events of his private and public life, and allows us to read the collector's personality against the light. This is the case of Paolo Ingegnoli (1861-1935), a wealthy Milanese entrepreneur, founder in 1884 – together with his brothers Francesco and Vittorio – of the 'Fratelli Ingegnoli' company. In love with beauty, between the end of the XNUMXth and the beginning of the XNUMXth century, Ingegnoli brought together an extraordinary collection of paintings, arranged according to the reasons for his passion and love for art.
From 13 October to 3 December 2017, the Galleria Bottegantica in Milan (via Manzoni 45) is hosting an exhibition that will retrace the stages that led to the birth and development of this famous Milanese collection.
The exhibition, curated by Enzo Savoia, Stefano Bosi and Valerio Rossi, in collaboration with the Ingegnoli heirs, will offer a selection of fifteen of the most important paintings already in the Milanese collection and currently held in public and private collections. By concession of the Ingegnoli heirs it will also be possible to document - through the archive material in their possession - the history of each individual painting, the personal relationship between Paolo Ingegnoli and the artists of his time, the original layout of the picture gallery.
The review favors the most significant nucleuses of the Ingegnoli collection through its main authors. The section dedicated to the Italians of Paris includes masterpieces including The Port of Venice by Giovanni Boldini. Divisionism is represented by two of its greatest exponents: Angelo Morbelli with The Empty Chair, a masterpiece that is part of the series dedicated to the Pio Albergo Trivulzio in Milan, and Carlo Fornara with Lavoro dei campi, a work that had a long gestation (1895-1936 ), and of which the artist has repeatedly intervened making substantial changes to the composition. The section dedicated to the Tuscan Macchiaioli brings together Il ghetto di Firenze by Telemaco Signorini and The collection of leaves by Giovanni Fattori in the rooms of Bottegantica. The exhibition itinerary is completed by works by Lorenzo Delleani, Giacomo Favretto, Domenico and Gerolamo Induno, Vincenzo Irolli, Luigi Nono and others.
In the intentions of its creator, the collection was to be a summa of 54th century Italian painting, without discrimination of any kind for schools and artists. His predilection for the 'new' led him to mainly favor the workers whose artistic poetics emerged unscathed – in some cases even strengthened – with the changing tastes and trends. Awareness of the artistic and cultural prestige of his picture gallery convinced Paolo Ingegnoli in recent years to grant the citizens of Milan the honor of visiting this extraordinary collection located on the noble floor of his building in Corso Buenos Aires XNUMX.
The Ingenious Collection. History of a passion for art in Milan is one of the initiatives organized by the Ingegnoli heirs to celebrate the two hundredth anniversary of the foundation of the family business.
Image: Giacomo Favretto, An interesting article (The painter's father and sister), 1874, Oil on canvas, 25 x 28 cm
