Study Group Details

Puccini’s "La Bohème" may be one of the most frequently performed operas in the entire repertoire. Less known are the works of "gli scapigliati," bohemians—writers and artists—who met in Milan from the 1860s to the 1880s. The scapigliati's aim (in Italian "scapigliato" means disheveled) was to break away from Romantic idealization and sentiment. In the process they laid the ground for the Italian avant-garde. This study group will look at and discuss some of the major progressive tendencies in the visual arts that followed Scapigliatura-Divisionism, Futurism, and "pittura metafisica." Perhaps we will succeed in "correcting" the widely-held view that artistic innovation during that time was the sole birthright of the French.