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Ettore de Conciliis is one of Italy’s most esteemed and internationally-renowned contemporary artists. He has developed great skill in a wide range of media, including oil painting, murals, sculpture and land art monuments.
For the past 30 years, de Conciliis has focused in particular on landscapes. His inspiration has mainly come from the Tiber River Valley north of Rome and from Long Island, New York.
Exhibitions
De Conciliis has been honored with personal exhibitions in some of the most important museums of art throughout Italy, including the Museum of Rome, Palazzo Braschi, the National Museum of Castel Sant’Angelo, and the Museum of San Salvatore in Lauro, all near Rome; the Reggia di Caserta near Naples; Palazzo Sant’Elia in Palermo; and the Fortezza Spagnola in L’Aquila.
In 2009 de Conciliis had a personal retrospective exhibition at the Academy of Fine Arts Museum in St. Petersburg, Russia. He has also had many personal exhibitions in distinguished art galleries in Rome and Milan, as well as in New York, Los Angeles, and Washington, DC. His paintings are in major collections worldwide.
The Artistist's Beginnings
Born in 1941 in Avellino, Italy, de Conciliis began drawing at the age of four. He learned to paint through observation and practice, spending hours in museums in Naples copying old master paintings such as those of Diego Velazquez. As a teenager, de Conciliis took lessons from the Italian-Brazilian painter Cesare Colasuono; he later studied architecture at the Universities of Naples and Rome and worked briefly with the sculptor Marino Mazzacurati. However, he is essentially self-taught.
Painting Murals
De Conciliis’ first major work occurred in 1963, when—at the age of 22—he was commissioned to paint the Mural of Peace in the Church of St. Francis in Avellino, Italy. The work was huge: 22 meters (72 feet) long by more than 6 meters (20 feet) high, and it took almost two years to complete.
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In the mural, de Conciliis depicted scenes of war and peace, which was the first time such scenes had ever been painted in a Catholic church in Italy. As a result, many people in the Church denounced the work as scandalous, and the issue was hotly debated in journals and newspapers throughout the world. The controversy was so large, in fact, that in 1965 it led to a private audience between de Conciliis and Pope Paul VI.
Today the Mural of Peace is considered a major work of art in the city of Avellino. After an earthquake damaged it in 1980, it was restored by a team of experts from the Vatican itself.
For the next ten years, de Conciliis was commissioned by cities across Italy, including Mantua, Modena, Reggio Emilia, and Bari, to paint murals. In 1971 he travelled to Mexico to work with David Alfaro Siqueiros in order to deepen his knowledge of mural painting techniques.
Creating Land Art
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In 1979, de Conciliis was commissioned by the regional government of Sicily to build a memorial in honor of eleven peasants who were massacred near Palermo in 1947 at a peaceful demonstration for land reform. The resulting monument, Portella della Ginestra, was the first example of land art in Italy.
De Conciliis constructed the monument on the land where the massacre had actually occurred. Working physically with the earth, he sculpted eleven huge boulders already present in the area: one for each of the victims. He also inscribed poems on some of the rocks and built pathways and low walls.
In describing the influence the experience had on his art, de Conciliis writes:
Portella della Ginestra is important in my career because it marks the moment in which I quit painting murals composed of figures and portraits and began concentrating on landscapes. Because this was a land art work, it was an opportunity to work directly with the earth and the natural landscape without the filter of the canvas.
Turning to Oil on Canvas
The year 1979 not only marked de Conciliis' journey into land art, but also a renewed focus on the more intimate dimensions of oil on canvas. The same intensity of feeling and concern for humanity that the artist displayed in his murals found a new focus in landscapes and still lifes.
The American author Jonathan Harr explained this transition in the book Ettore de Conciliis, Paintings from 1979–2002:
After spending most of a decade working on these commissions, he found himself yearning to paint smaller, more intimate pieces. He decided to devote himself to painting art that spoke to him from his soul rather than his intellect.
Painting Landscapes
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Since 1980 de Conciliis has dedicated himself mainly to landscape painting. His work reveals a great sensitivity to, and a deep appreciation for, the beauty of nature. Human presence is suggested only indirectly, for example through roads, cultivated pastures, distant houses, and boats on the Tiber River.
The Italian art critic Mario De Micheli wrote:
He knows very well that nature’s integrity is threatened. By painting the beauty of nature, Ettore de Conciliis is inviting others to defend, protect and guard its treasures.
Building the Park of Peace
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In 2002, the Regional Government of Lazio commissioned de Concliis to create the Park of Peace just south of Rome. The project began with the challenge of restoring a park—10 hectares (24 acres) in size—that was essentially in ruins.
De Conciliis' goal was to transform the park into a living example of peaceful co-existence between world religions and between human beings and nature. To do so, he created three huge stone sculptures dedicated to the three monotheistic religions: Christianity, Judaism and Islam.
De Conciliis placed each sculpture on three different hills facing each other, symbolically suggesting that a peaceful dialogue is taking place between them. In addition, he designed numerous paths in the park and lined them with smaller stone boulders, each of which is inscribed with poems and quotations of peace from cultures and religions around the world. His landscape design also included an amphitheatre and many new trees, shrubs and flowers.
After seven years of work, the park opened in 2009.
Unifying Nature with Social Ideals
De Conciliis’ commitment to the environment and his ideals of peace between diverse peoples and cultures unify his landscape paintings and works of land art. In this way, the artist’s need to poetically express the beauty of the natural world melds harmoniously with his social ideals.
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To appreciate nature through art is to become more conscious of who we are.
It is a way of connecting with reality.
Otherwise, we become alienated from ourselves and from the world.
—Ettore de Conciliis
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