Pietro Annigoni: Francesco Bartoli

Drawing by Pietro Annigoni

"In 1923 my father sent me to Milan's famous Calchi-Taeggi College, where I lived a sort of double life. On the one hand, a dreamy student, mad about art; on the other, a juvenile gangster resenting authority and conformity. The good side began when I was befriended by Professor Francesco Bartoli, who subsequently taught me Classics - and oh, so much more - for a whole year. On his desk during the examination was a large art book with an illustrated cover that attracted and held my attention. After the test was over he asked me why I was so interested in the book and I told him it was because I intended to be a painter. He said that he, too, loved painting, and from then on he did all he could to encourage me in my ambition. He believed that none of the arts should be exclusive and taught me to love and appreciate architecture, poetry, music, and great literature.

Bartoli was a leading light of a Milanese society called The Friends of Art, whose members were artisans, craftsmen, or just working men interested in the arts. On Sundays he conducted groups of these men around one of the city's many museums, art galleries, or treasure-filled churches. And he took me along with them. His son, who was about my age, came too. Then, one Sunday that I remember so well, we went to the Brera Museum to see the wonderful collection or paintings there. But I must confess that it was not the paintings that made that particular visit so memorable. The Professor's daughter, accompanied us and I was dazed by her beauty. She seemed to me to have stepped straight out of Leonardo's painting of Beatrice d'Este, a portrait that I had long been in love with.

It would be impossible for me to list all the enduring pleasures of this life that Francesco Bartoli opened up to me. They were not only cultural pleasures. He instilled in me a love of nature, of the open air and, particularly, of mountains. He was himself a mountaineer and spent all his summer holidays in the Dolomites where, tragically, his son died scaling a needle, which was later named after him. My own climbing experiences were not over-ambitious, but sketching expeditions in the smaller mountain ranges of North Italy, alone or with friends and sometimes lasting several weeks, brought me many unforgettable adventures."

To be continued

(Excerpted from "Pietro Annigoni: An Artist's Life" by Pietro Annigoni, 1977.)