Vittorio Corcos

Vittorio Matteo Corcos painted fashionable young women and men of the Belle Époque in moments of leisure: walking by the sea, sitting in gardens, reading or daydreaming. His style is polished and bright, with fine dresses, parasols and hats, and faces that look straight out at the viewer.

He was born in Livorno in 1859, studied at the Florence Academy and then with Domenico Morelli in Naples. In Paris he met Léon Bonnat and worked for the dealers Goupil, showing at the Salon in the 1880s. Back in Florence he became one of Italy’s most sought after portrait painters, with sitters including Giacomo Puccini and Queen Amélie of Portugal. His best known picture, Dreams of 1896, shows a young woman on a bench with books beside her and hangs in the Galleria Nazionale d’Arte Moderna in Rome.

In pictures like A Summer Stroll, notice the clear, silvery light on white fabric.