Bruno Capacci was born in Venice in 1906 but spent his youth in Florence. He settled in Paris in 1930, where he became a member of the “Italians of Paris” along with De Chirico, Severini, Magni, Magnelli and Leonor Fini. The capacchi of the “Metaphysical Age” was influenced by De Chirico and the great Renaissance masters such as Uccello, della Francesca and Ghirlandaio. In 1930 he met and married the Belgian artist Suzanne Van Damme at the famous brasserie “Le Dome”. The couple were the surrealist poets Paul u00c9luard, Paul Collinet, Marcel Lecomte, Louis Soutenaire and Henri Bauchaud, Andru00e9 Breton, Marcel Duchamp, Henri Michaud, Jean Cocteau and Louise de Villemorin. , Federico Fellini, Jean Paulin, and actor Louis Jouvet. Close others. In 1947, the “Surrealist Pope” invited Andre Breton Capacz and Van Damme to the “Surrealist International Exposition” to be held at the Margut Gallery in Paris, and invited Arp, Bellmer, Brauner, Calder, Duchamp, Ernst, Giacometti, Gorky, Lamb, Matta, Milo, Picabia, Man Ray, Tanguy, Tanning, etc. Capacchi’s paintings became more and more sophisticated and poetic. He also published surrealist poetry in the book La balustrade du Possible. His photographs reveal his boundless imagination, his delicate color palette and, above all, his extraordinary joie de vivre. His favorite themes include moonscapes and fantastic bestiary, reminiscent of Klee and Brauner.
When the couple moved to Florence in the 1950s, they built a beautiful house with stunning views of the surrounding Fiesole hills. Inspired by the great idol Andrea della Robbia, Capacchi began making a line of ceramics that he displayed throughout his home and sold to a variety of clients, including numerous wealthy Americans. Each year the couple exhibited in galleries in the United States: Chicago (Marshall Field Gallery 1959), New York (Thibault Gallery on Madison Avenue 1961), Los Angeles, Baltimore and Dallas (Calhoun Gallery 1961).
Capacci also had a taste for marble and mosaics, and produced many decorative panels inspired by ancient Etruscan and Byzantine art. A versatile artist and poet, Capacz made porcelain plates in his Havilland factory in Limoges, Christofle in Paris, and his ateliers in Rosenthal, Germany. In the 1970s Capacz and Van Damme returned to Brussels and lived in a house near Avenue Louise.
His first 1990 exhibition in the Group 2 gallery was a tribute to Suzanne Van Damme, followed by his 1991 solo exhibition of Capacci. Capacci died in Brussels in 1996, shortly after the opening of Van Damme’s Capacci exhibition at the same gallery.
www.ftn-books.com has the Group 2 catalog now available.
