13 CASE BOMBARDATE- EN

13  Case bombardate, 1945 oil on canvas, 50 x 70 cm

This horizontal view of Piazza Grande in Viareggio concludes the series of works dedicated to the war period, showing the buildings devastated by the bombs. In the foreground on the right, on a bare ground with rare tufts of grass, stands a gutted white building, bordered on the left by a crumbling wall and on the right by a reddish fence. In the background, bombed houses overlook the road that defines the square. The work conveys a sense of devastation and abandonment, accentuated by the aridity of the land and the uninhabitability of the white building. Despite the desolation, the blue sky and the bright colors of the work recall those used for the frescoes of San Martino, colors that Catarsini purchased at great risk in a specialized shop in Florence, reachable only by crossing the Gothic Line during the war period.

Insights

The vision of the destroyed city in this oil recalls, in subject and pictorial style, the ruined city present in the fresco of San Martino in Freddana behind the Virgin. However, here the city appears transfigured, thanks to the use of diluted spots of color that blur the contours and soften the still solid volumes of the houses. Through this dissolving in light, the artist seems to want to attenuate the wounds of the ruins and, with obstinacy, seek and reaffirm the beauty and poetry of a city that survives and resists the horror of war. In Catarsini, the truth is not only what is seen, but above all what he feels and what he also expresses through deformations and transfigurations of reality.2.