Amedeo Modigliani - Andre Salmon - The Complete Works online - The Adventures of Modern Art TV -
Every great work of art should be considered like any work of nature. First of all from the point of view of its aesthetic reality and then not just from its development and the mastery of its creation but from the standpoint of what has moved and agitated its creator. Amedeo Modigliani
The function of art is to struggle against obligation. Amedeo Modigliani
With one eye you are looking at the outside world, while with the other you are looking within yourself. Amedeo Modigliani
From the day that he abandoned himself to certain forms of debauchery, an unexpected light came upon him, transforming his art. From that day on, he became one who must be counted among the masters of living art. Andre Salmon
Amedeo Clemente Modigliani (July 12, 1884 – January 24, 1920) was an Italian artist of Jewish heritage, practicing both painting and sculpture, who pursued his career for the most part in France. Modigliani was born in Livorno (historically referred to in English as Leghorn), in Northwestern Italy and began his artistic studies in Italy before moving to Paris in 1906.
Influenced by the artists in his circle of friends and associates, by a range of genres and art movements, and by primitive art, Modigliani’s oeuvre was nonetheless unique and idiosyncratic.
He died in Paris of tubercular meningitis, exacerbated by poverty, overworking, and an excessive use of alcohol and narcotics, at the age of 35. The Complete Works online
Modigliani was Jewish: he was even known occasionally to punch an anti-Semite … For a long time Modigliani struggled through his bouts of illness, seeking to achieve his dream – the one and only thing that truly mattered to him – to be a sculptor but stone was too expensive … The dust from striking the stone was making its way its his way painfully into his lungs. Modigliani carved and he coughed … His health prevented him from being the sculptor he dreamed of being. So he turned to painting. Adventures of Modern Art III: Paris: Capital of the World 1916–1920, Sky Arts 2020