Seated Lady in Landscape

The painting, beautifully experimental and rough, an exquisite and seductive masterpiece of the most scintillating “macchia,” was chosen by Vitali for the cover of the volume dedicated to the Lettere dei macchiaioli, which he published in the Einaudi Essays series in 1953 – the first serious and rigorously documented research on the protagonists of the verista “revolution,” which also contributed to overcoming the provincial and apologetic viewpoint of the interventions of critics of the early 20th century.

Signora all’aperto (also known as Donna al sole or Signora al mare) is related to Silvestro Lega’s painting on the rocks (formerly Milan collection Giacomo and Ida Jucker), but especially to a series of small studies and drawings that revolve around the famous and delightful quadretto La rotonda di Palmieri (Florence, Galleria d’Arte Moderna) painted by Fattori in 1866 in solitary research in Livorno, in one of the happiest moments of his life.

A decisive image, constructed with great simplicity and clarity, for luminous planes and geometric color, it has a very elegant elongated cut and almost abstract tarsia solutions of extreme freedom. It was purchased by Vitali in 1928 at one of the many auctions of 19th-century paintings made at the Scopinich Gallery in Milan. It had previously been in the collection of Mario Galli.