Provenance

Acquired from the artist by the current owner, Chicago, United States of America, 1980.

Notes

Letterio "Leo" Calapai was an Italian-American printmaker, engraver and painter. Born in Boston, Massachusetts in 1903, he studied at the Massachusetts School of Art, the Beaux Arts Institute of Design and at the American Artists School.

He began his career as a commercial lithographer in a printing shop but soon after abandoned this to pursue his own printing practice, funded by one of his former professors. He held his first exhibition in 1933, a one man show of his oil paintings, at the Art Center in New York City. In the following years, he expanded his practice, taking inspiration from the works of writers such as William Carlos Williams and Thomas Wolfe. He later went on to establish his printing studio in 1960 and taught printmaking at various tertiary institutions.

Calapai's work can be described as colourful, vibrant and technically brilliant, using various artistic approaches with great skill to create powerful visual images.