Word: afro
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Dates: during 1950-1959
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...mild, mellow, delicately tuned abstractions that one Manhattan gallery put on display last week would soon become passé. Done by a 38-year-old Italian who signs only his first name, "Afro," they made an interesting historical footnote to the season's splashier shows...
...family," Afro says, "art is a disease." His father and uncle were painting partners who decorated the ceilings of Venetian mansions with flowers and figures, and Afro's two brothers are sculptors. At eight, Afro joined the family business, painting imitation marble walls. He progressed to ceilings at 14, later studied in Venice and Florence, and taught at the Academy of Venice. His evolution from decorative art through traditional painting to abstraction was slow...
Composed of interlocking planes of soft, clear color, Afro's abstractions look rather like shattered Venetian glass seen through a watery film. His colors are very much his own, but his compositions are not; when reproduced in black & white they appear to rest solidly on the cubist experiments of Braque and Picasso. Afro's close harmonies of color and texture also reflect his long apprenticeship as a decorative artist. His delicate yet decisive lines and contrapuntal arrangement of shapes show a draftsmanship that comes only from long study...
Puccini: Turandot (Gina Cigna, soprano; Armando Giannotti, tenor; Luciano Neroni, basso; Francesco Merli, tenor; Magda Olivero, soprano; Afro Poli, baritone; EIAR Symphony Orchestra and chorus, Franco Ghione conducting; Cetra-Soria, 6 sides LP). Puccini's last, but not best opera gets as good a performance as possible. Recording: good...
Verdi: Excerpts from Falstaff (Mariano Stabile, baritone; Afro Poli, baritone; Vittoria Palombini, mezzo-soprano; Giuseppe Nessi, tenor; Luciano Donaggio, bass; La Scala Orchestra, Alberto Erede conducting; Capitol-Telefunken; 6 sides). Baritone Stabile, now 61, was the best Falstaff in the business when these recordings were originally made before World War II. Capitol's repressing job is good...