2. Artists & stock
3. Emilio Vedova
4. Biography

Notes of biography

Born in a working class family, Emilio Vedova is born in Venice in 1919. He spends most of his life in Venice and teaches many years at the Academy of Fine Arts in this city. His journey is - throughout his existence - that of a self-taught artist. Influenced by expressionism painting during his apprenticeship, he joins in 1942 the group "Corrente" (Renato Guttuso, Birolli, etc.).
In Fascist Italy, the work of Vedova is considered "subversive". At the fall of Mussolini (1943), the Germans take power. Emilio Vedova joins the partisans and enters the resistance; he fights until 1945 in the mountains of Frioul and is injured.
Painter and engraver, he plays an important artistic role in the immediate post-war, and in the European avant-garde. Early in his career, the main theme of his work is the desperate condition of man in a world of aggression and social injustice.
 In 1946, he co-writes the manifesto of "Fronte Nuovo delle Arti" and his activity reflects the violence of the debate between realism and abstraction that is held in Italy. Under the strong influence of the Futurists and Picasso, Vedova happens to realize a harsh and violent creation, always governed by black. He then conceives series of works (Black Geometrics, Explosion, Battles, Europe, Concentration Camp) where the selection of the titles shows and supports the identity content of political revolt and denunciation.
In 1952, Vedova becomes an influential member of the "Gruppo degli Otto - Group of Eight" (with Afro Basaldella, Birolli, Corpora, Santomaso, Morlotti, Moreni and Turcato); this group influences the movement of the "Arte Povera". During the 50s, Emilio Vedova produces other series (Cycle of protest, Cycle of nature, Cycle for Brazil) to reach the summit of Italian informal Art.
Vedova develops a spontaneous and gestural style for which he is known today; behind the apparent chaos, the artist creates a highly structured space, consisting of different planes, lines and signs strongly identifiable as crosses, triangles, circles, and writing.
In the 60s, the artist follows a new path; this is the time of the "Plurimi", painted arrangements in relation to the surrounding space. In the 80s, Vedova produces impressive pictures; the sweeping gesture of the artist, of extreme violence, denounces and protests again forcefully. From late 1963 to mid 1965, Vedova has a grant from the Ford Foundation and resides in Berlin. "In Berlin, and only there and nowhere else, I worked, loved and hated, suffered ... as much as in Venice," he writes.
Multi-talented artist, Emilio Vedova collaborates with theater and opera, builds a large graphic works (lithographs, etchings, portfolio), works on the volume, etc.
Vedova exhibits eleven times at the Biennial in Venice (since 1948) and is represented four times in the Documenta in Kassel. He's probably the only artist to have participated in all fifteen times to the two major manifestations of contemporary art. Emilio Vedova disappears in Venice in 2006; he is 87 years. "His" city has dedicated to him a museum-foundation (next to the Pinault Collection at the Point of the Dogana), designed by architect Renzo Piano.

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