Two artists had bewitched Margherita Sarfatti: the painter Mario Sironi, to whom she was also linked by a long relationship, and the sculptor Adolfo Wildt.
The exhibition curated by Fabio Benzi that the Galleria Russo in Rome dedicates until October 31st to the protagonist of the Italian cultural scene in the 1920s reserves great space for the works of the two masters.
The first European art critic, polyglot, cultured and emancipated, from a rich Venetian Jewish family who moved to Milan, Margherita Grassini was not only the lover of the Duce, whom she had met in the editorial office of the socialist newspaper '' Avanti! ''.
The exhibition 'Margherita Sarfatti and the art in Italy between the two wars' presents about fifty works, including real masterpieces, mostly from his collection.
'"We wanted to privilege the cultural element while neglecting the business aspect due to the total lack of proposals on the part of the Campidoglio" points out Fabrizio Russo, manager of the Gallery, linked to the Sarfatti family by an ancient kinship.
It is precisely from the names of the artists followed by Sarfatti that a hitherto neglected topic emerges.
'"She was a compulsive and passionate collector, much more varied and creative than one might think - explains Benzi -. She was linked to the Novecento group but at home she had Cagli, Pirandello and other Roman authors, works by futurists such as Boccioni and Balla, and great foreign artists. He was a complex and multifaceted figure ".
An Italian Peggy Guggenheim, an ante litteram feminist.
'' A queen without a crown '' called her Alma Mahler, who met her when she fell from grace.
'' It is time to reread his figure as an intellectual, who begins his journey well before joining Mussolini, the man who forged, whom he loved and whose tragic end foreshadowed in advance '', he writes in the text in Rachele Ferrario catalog.
In the selection of the works on display the Sironi stand out, including the evocative self-portrait in charcoal of 1906, 11 among marbles and bronzes by Wildt, Medardo Rosso, Gino Severini, Achille Funi, a portrait of 1927 by Giorgio De Chirico with a dedication to Sarfatti in 1931 . (ANSA).
