Mario Avati

 

France, Born 1921

"Le Pecheur Optimiste"

 

"The Optimistic Fisherman"

 

Color Mezzotint engraving
(Maniere noire couleur)

Numbered 8/12

 

Platemark dimensions: 29 X 24 cm

 

Mario Avati has been hailed at the leading contemporary practitioner of one of the most difficult printmaking techniques - the Mezzotint. He pioneered the modern use of color in this medium (this print in the "Maniere noire coulour" is an example).

 

Born in Monaco to Italian parents, Mario Avati studied at the Écoles des Arts Décoratifs in Nice, where he was a student of Jules Lengrand, and later at the Ecole des Beaux-Arts in Paris.

 

He has worked with the prestigious Tamarind Institute, and the Museum of Modern Art in New York owns an extensive collections of his prints.

 

Avati has won numerous awards and is the subject of several documentary films. His works are held in more than 100 public collections including the Victoria & Albert Museum, the Uffizi in Florence, the Cleveland Museum of Art (5 works) and the National Gallery in Washington.

 

A catalogue raisonné: Roger Passeron, Avati: L’Oeuvre Gravé,