War Biennali in 1940 and 1942: taste and sales during the Fascist era

This article focuses on sale drivers at the 1940 and 1942 Biennali. The comparison between the two editions underlines the crucial role played by Milanese gallerist Ettore Gian Ferrari who headed the Biennale’s sales office in 1942, after the previous edition’s disappointing commercial results. He managed to increase the purchases substantially, especially by private collectors, following the National Education Minister Giuseppe Bottai’s plan to promote contemporary art. During the Second World War, the Biennale was a privileged platform to observe the relationships between public and private sectors, and between ideology and culture. Bottai’s strategy aimed at opposing the Italian submission to Nazi artistic policies. He stressed the peculiarities of Italian art as an identitymaking process combining tradition and modernity and sought to preserve and defend the ‘quality ’of the artworks. This article analyses how issues such as investment, prestige, nationalism, taste intervened in the purchases by private collectors. Moreover it surveys Gian Ferrari’s skills as gallerist, the massive boom experienced by the art market during the war, Bottai’s strong influence. Alberto Salietti’s success, with twenty paintings sold at the 1942 Biennale, is an exemplary case to grasp the mechanisms of a war art market, a complex and above all unpredictable setting.