Paolo Emilio Passaro - Untitled

The painting can be defined as a genre scene, that is, the depiction of an episode of everyday life that, apparently, lacks any significant element. These types of domestic subjects were long considered minor and only began to spread in Western art starting in the 17th century. Only with the development of 19th-century realism did everyday subjects become considered as important as historical or religious ones. The painter Paolo Emilio Passaro, of the realist/verist school, draws inspiration from historical or newsworthy episodes in several of his works, as in this case.

As previously mentioned, the work fits stylistically within a realist framework. This is evident from the composition itself. The event captured in the news is captured on the canvas fleetingly, almost instantaneously, as if the artist had taken a snapshot on the spot (which speaks volumes about the close connection between the new art of photography and the pictorial movements of the late nineteenth and early twentieth centuries). From this perspective, the composition of the work is highly eloquent; the scene is framed with an almost casual, slightly diagonal angle. The artist is not interested in carefully calibrated balance in the composition, but prefers to imbue the scene with an authenticity that can be found in its temporary and unrepeatable nature. For this reason, Passaro, with a decidedly dynamic hatching, helps to capture a precise situation of light and atmosphere. And it is here that the excellent technical and artistic prowess of a master like Paolo Emilio Passaro is evident. His realist streak does not prevent him from describing things with extraordinary naturalism. Everything is bathed in a coherent light that perfectly unifies the scene. Furthermore, Passaro's touch, besides being soft, is also charged with vibrations that give the work a fresh execution, bringing it back to the truth of existence. It is all this that makes Paolo Emilio Passaro a masterful interpreter of that pictorial climate that, between the late 19th and early 20th centuries, succeeded in combining the extraordinary quality of academically trained painting with the immediacy of execution brought by the innovations of the Impressionists.

Paolo Emilio Passaro, Vallo della Lucania 1878, Naples 1956. He studied at the Neapolitan Institute of Fine Arts, under Domenico Morelli, Filippo Palizzi, and Michele Cammarano. He participated in numerous national and international exhibitions, and held solo exhibitions in Naples, Rome, Salerno, and Milan. At an exhibition organized by the "Salvator Rosa" Promoter in Naples, one of his paintings, "Half Figure," was purchased by the King; two other large canvases of his are owned by the Municipality of Naples, and the "Portrait of Domenico Morelli," exhibited at the first Neapolitan Biennale, was purchased by that Province. Also in Naples, at the 1930 "Pro Cultura" exhibition, his paintings included: "Portrait of Mrs. Passaro," "Silence," "Rest," "San Gregorio Armeno," "Interior of Santa Chiara," and "Hospital for the Poor."

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