Elizabeth P.

Lor

Dr. Milissa Urlando

Art 133 Section 3

14, September 2015

Autobiography of Amedeo Modigliani

I was the last of four child, born on the 12 of July, 1884 to Flaminio and Eugenia Modigliani in

Livorno Italy. Shortly before my birth my family fell on hard times, but people said that my birth saved

my family most valued heirlooms due to an old Italian custom that forbade the seizure of any possessions

in the bed of a woman in labor, which my mother was surely in labor when officers came to our house to

take our belongings away. My parents named me Amedeo Modigliani, or Dedo.

Growing up I was always close to my mother. Due to my mother's upbring all of my siblings and

I were well educated. I was known to love poetry, literature and due to my maternal grandfather love of

philosophy, I learned to love philosophy as too. My mother schooled me until I was 10. After an attack

of pleurisy when I was about 11, my health deteriorate from then on. At the age of fourteen, while sick

with typhoid fever, I told my mother that what I really wanted was to see the paintings in the Palazzo Pitti

and the Uffizi in Florence due to hearing about the great works held in Florence. My mother promise that

once I was well enough to travel she would take me herself. After I recovered from my fever mother took

me to tour and when we came back to Livorno I was enrolled me under the best painter in Livorno,

Guglielmo Micheli.
 Studying under Micheli, I was introduced to Macchiaioli, which is doing much of one's painting

of landscape outdoors in order to capture natural light, shade, and colour. Although I was exposed to

Macchiaioli, I chose a proto-Cubist palette more akin to Czanne than to the Macchiaioli and preferring to

paint in my studio instead of out in cafes or in the open. Not only was I exposed to Macchiaioli, I studied

portraiture, still life, and the nude. Nudes being one of my best works. In 1891, at the age of 16 I got

tuberculosis, putting an end to my study with Micheli.. In 1902, I enrolled myself to the Scuola Libera di

Nudo, or "Free School of Nude Studies", of the Accademia di Belle Arti in Florence, where my lifelong

love for life drawing will develop. After still fighting with tuberculosis a year later I moved to Venice,

where I enrolled to study in Regia Accademia ed Istituto di Delle Arti and there is where I first smoked

hashish, instead of studying.

I left to Paris, France in 1906. There I became friends with a sculptor Jacob Epstein and met

great artistes. I wrote to mother often and drank wine here in there but as the year came by I became an

alcoholic and drug addict to maybe hide the fact that I had tuberculosis. Having tuberculosis would have

made others fear and pity me because tuberculosis was the leading cause of death in France by 1900. In

1909 I left back home to recover from my sickness and wild lifestyle. I return back to France shortly after

recovering, this time renting a studio in Montparnasse where I was encouraged to be a sculptor by Paul

Guillaume, an art dealer who took a liking to my work. He also introduced me to sculptor Constantin

Brancusi, who I became a disciple of his for a year. Following the advice of Brancusi, I studied and was

influenced by African sculpture. I focused on only sculpting from 1909 to 1914 and return back to only

painting afterward. From 1916 to 1919 where the time I painted my best-known nudes. These series of

nudes was commissioned by my dealer and friend Leopold Zborowski, who let me use his apartment,

supplied me models and painting materials. He also paid me each day for my work, without wanting

anything more then my paintings.

In 1917, I met my love Jeanne Hebuterne, an art student. Jeanne became a subject of many of my

painting. I had my first and only art show, Paris of 1917 in Berthe Weill Gallery in Paris. It was closed

by police on my opening day due to my nudes painting, but once my nudes paintings were taken down,
my show continued on as if nothing ever happened. Towards the end of World War 1, Jeanne and I both

left Paris to escape from the war and travelled to Nice and Cagnes-sur-Mer. On November 29, 1918

Jeanne gave birth to our daughter who we named Jeanne. The following year Jeanne became pregnant

again and this time I got engaged to her, but due to my reputation as an alcoholic and drug user her

parents were against the marriage. That didnt stop me from recognizing my daughter. My health rapidly

deteriorated, but I continued to paint and paint. We were found in bed by worried neighbours who

havent seen us in days. I was in my final state of my disease, dying of tubercular meningitis. Something

I fought with since I was 16. I would die January 24, 1920 at the Hopital de la Charie, leaving my

beloved Jeanne 8 months pregnant. Little did I know that she would jump out of a fifth-floor window

killing herself and our unborn child the following day.

During my lifetime I was not well known for my work. I did not fit with Cubism (an abstracted form,

broken up into three-dimensional objects), Dadaism (a movement the involved visual arts, literature,

theatre, and graphic design, prevailing standards in art through anti-art cultural works), Surrealism (using

everyday objects to create odd creatures, allowing it to express itself), or Futurism (movement that

emphasized speed, technology, youth and violence), I wanted to be different. Little did I know that after

my death was where my fame will soar and where I will be known to modernize two themes of art

history: the portrait and the nude.

 Work cited

Abramson, Glenda. Encyclopedia of Modern Jewish Culture. London: Routledge, 2005. 595. Print.

"Amedeo Modigliani." The Biography.com Website. A&E Television Networks, n.d. Web. 13 Sept.

2015. <http://www.biography.com/people/amedeo-modigliani-9410904>.

"Amedeo Modigliani." - Wikipedia, the Free Encyclopedia. N.p., n.d. Web. 13 Sept. 2015.

<https://en.m.wikipedia.org/wiki/Amedeo_Modigliani>.

"Amedeo Modigliani Biography." Amedeo Modigliani Biography. N.p., n.d. Web. 14 Sept.

2015. <http://amedeo-modigliani.paintings.name/>.