GEMITO, Vincenzo

Italian sculptor and draughtsman. He was a child of the streets, who was adopted by a poor artisan. In 1861, at only nine years of age, he entered the workshop of the sculptor Emanuele Caggiano (1837-1905) as an assistant and dogsbody. Around this time he formed a close friendship with the painter Antonio Mancini; together they frequented the studio of Stanislao Lista (1824-1908), a sculptor and painter of a more advanced tendency. There Gemito learnt to model in clay and wax, and he is supposed to have been encouraged by Lista to study the life of the streets. After leaving Lista’s studio Gemito set up independently in an abandoned convent, working alongside Mancini and the sculptors Achille D’Orsi and Giovanni Battista Amendola (1848-1887).

Gemito’s Neapolitan Fisherboy at the 1877 Paris Salon brought him acclaim and commissions, and he stayed for three years. Upon returning, he studied antique sculpture at the Naples Museum and incorporated Hellenistic influences into his work. Reviving the lost-wax process of casting used in the Renaissance, Gemito built his own bronze foundry in 1883. Three years later, he completed his only important public commission, a marble statue of Charles V, Holy Roman Emperor.

In 1887 Gemito suffered a mental collapse and withdrew to one room, concentrating entirely on drawing and seeing few friends. Around 1909 he resumed sculpting, basing his works on the ancients with a delicacy and detail that ultimately derived from his drawings.