Alberto Pisa
1864–1936

Alberto Pisa was born on March 19, 1864, in Ferrara, Italy. His early studies were in Ferrara with Gaetano Domenichini, and he later attended both the Florence and Rome Academies of Fine Arts.

In Florence he joined the Macchiaioli movement, a group of Tuscan painters, active in the second half of the nineteenth century, who painted outdoors in order to capture natural light, shade, and color, thus breaking with the conventions taught by Italian academicians. In many ways they were forerunners of the French Impressionists.

In 1901 a Times review referred to Pisa’s watercolors of Italian towns as “charming; both in the details of architecture and in general town views he is far beyond the average of the men who paint picturesque Italy.” It may have been this review that led to A&C Black’s commission for Rome in 1904. The paintings of Rome—and some of Umbria—were displayed at the Fine Art Society in October 1905. Reviewing the exhibition, the Times said, “Mr. Pisa shows us Rome full of lights and air, and aglow with beautiful colours in stone and trees and flowers.”

His later work as an illustrator for A&C Black consisted of Pompeii (1910) and Sicily, published in 1911. His illustrations were recycled in a number of later books, as was the publisher’s usual practice.

Pisa continued to paint watercolor architectural and genre scenes in Florence and Tuscany during the 1920s, and his last exhibition was in 1927. He died in Florence on July 15, 1930.

His paintings can be found in the collections at the National Gallery of Modern Art in Rome, the Palazzo dei Diamanti in Ferrara, and the Bristol City Museum.

Information for these biographical details was largely provided by the Dizionario Enciclopedico dei Pittori e degli Incisori italiani and the Catalogo Bolaffi della Pittura italiana dell’800.

Take a look at some of Alberto Pisa’s paintings.