Me at 12 years old, with my first awesome racing bike!
…I come from a sporty family of cyclists. We had been true pioneers of this noble sport: my father Angelo and my uncle Pietro -who was three times champion of Italy, winner of the first Tre Valli Varesine (1919), participant in the Olympic Games of Anversa (1920) and won a Tour of the Lake of Lemano (1923)- was the first Italian man to reach the podium in Paris - Roubaix (1925). He won several Six-Days in Europe and in the United States, where he coupled with Costante Girardengo. He was a great champion. I had the honor, as the first male in my family to be born after his untimely death, to take the name…”
Uncle - Pietro Bestetti,
(1898 -1936)
Father - Angelo Bestetti,
(1902 - 1973)
Mantua me genuit
“…By quoting Virgilio I’d like to express the pride of being born in this ancient city where I lived the sweetest part of my childhood…
"The dream can begin from here," Guido Piovene wrote about Mantova in his famous work Viaggio in Italia “and in fact, for us children, the illustrious past was the hidden director of the daily unconscious recital of living, as we were protected by austere buildings that were a backdrop to our stories, which we still had to invent”
Myself - 1967
Carlo Carrà, “Il Cavaliere Occidentale” - 1917.
"... This painting by the Futurist Master encloses most of the pictorial and symbolic elements (the mask, the vertical decorations of the jacket, the graphic of the the background, the concept of a solitary knight...) which composed the essence of my graphic research. I was so impressed by the Masters of the Italian Renaissance such as Piero della Francesca, Paolo Uccello, Simone Martini and the others that, when I saw for the first time this work by Carrà in 1960 , I felt amazed and pleased to see that he also had been subjugated by them and that his futuristic vision produced a revolutionary renewal. Indeed the allegorical /decorative elements which were typical in fifteenth century’s Italian paintings - rich costumes decorated with vertical stripes, beavers, peculiar architectural structures, graphic rhythms of halberds lines in scenes of war and more - which were a mere quote and representation of everyday life, now become (or could be) the supporting structure of a new pictorial and graphic mood. Such mood could influence several aesthetic disputes and artistic contents which were different and new, and could be applied to my personal artistic needs... "
Paul Klee, "Principe Nero" - 1927
"... To us, students at the School of Art, Paul Klee was 'love at first sight'. He was an idol who could be compared to a rock star in figurative art: his works seemed to us the obvious evolution of modern art, which unquestionably indicated the way to follow. Its rarefied pictures and undefined graphic signs appeared to us as “full of cultures” since they evoked the codes of ancient cultures and remote worlds (which he had already visited) and they really impressed us... "
© Carlo Carrà by SIAE 2014
1961 - A Parigi! A Parigi!
Prima tappa, Nizza: bagni Beau Rivage.
Parigi, a noi due!
1961 - Award Ceremony at Palazzo del Senato school year 1960-61, Milan.
1960 – Wall painting cm.300x300. 17 years, my first "real" job order!
The beginnings
"... About ten years old, in Mantua’s hot summers, with my friends. I started swimming in the lake, unbeknown to my parents. I turned to the city with the water up to my eyes and looked at its skyline. It looked like flying, so elegant and mysterious, so free in space. The effect was due to the sky that was perfectly reflecting in the water. Later, remembering this phenomenon, I had an idea for the drawings named "Città Ideali Volanti". That image has always been vivid in my mind. It followed me over time and it is one of the recurring themes of my artistic path... "
"... Mom (carrying the umbrella) and two of her several friends who attended our house. Glamour, freedom, authority, elegance, culture, gentleness, intelligence: those women played a relevant role in my cultural education. Years later, reminding of them, I made a long series of pencil portraits, which are rather emblematic of the way I felt their presence ... "
