From 19 March to 29 June Villa Bardini has housed the exhibition Fattori and Naturalism in Tuscany (curated by Francesca Dini), dedicated to Fattori, the painter of fields. Approximately 40 paintings belonging to his naturalistic period, mainly large-sized, have been exhibited to highlight the relationship between the artist and some of his Tuscan followers from the next generation ( the Tommasis, Sorbi, Cecconi, Micheli, Panerai, the Giolis, Cannicci, Ferroni). An exhibition for connoisseurs, which enriches the parallel monographic exhibition in Leghorn by documenting Fattori’s evolution from realism to symbolism.

In Autumn (17 September – 15 November) the Accademia di Belle Arti hosts
The Places of Giovanni Fattori at the Academy of Fine Arts of Florence, past and present, a fascinating retrospective with drawings, photos, objects, curated by Giuliana Videtta and Anna Gallo and set up in the classrooms where the painter studied and taught, premises which have been renovated and now open to the public for the first time.

The program will culminate in the exhibition The Other Face of the Soul. Portraits by Giovanni Fattori (October 2008 – January 2009, curated by Giuliano Matteucci and Carlo Sisi), held at the Gallery of Modern Art in Palazzo Pitti based on a project by the Istituto Matteucci. A selection of 60 portraits will throw light on a little-known aspect of this artist, one of the most complex and surprising of his personality: a painter who, changing over time through a constant evolution of his style, becomes one of the most thorough and subtle observers of the soul of his times.

Also The Macchiaioli Painters and Photography (Alinari Museum, 4 December 2008 – 15 February 2009, curated by Monica Maffioli) is an unprecedented event. For the first time the relationship between the exponents of the movement and the revolution brought about by photography, with its technologically produced images, will be dealt with in depth. A comparison between beautiful, rare photos and paintings by Signorini, Fattori, Borrani, for an exhibition that is linked with the themes of the Zibaldone and of the other exhibitions.