Nestore Leoni

Italian painter
The basics

Quick Facts

IntroItalian painter
PlacesItaly
wasPainter Illuminator
Work fieldArts Creativity
Gender
Male
Birth14 February 1862, L’Aquila, Province of L'Aquila, Abruzzo, Italy
Death1947Rome, Province of Rome, Lazio, Italy (aged 84 years)
Star signAquarius
The details

Biography

Illumination by Leoni for a 1902 edition of a book by Alfred, Lord Tennyson

Nestore Leoni (L'Aquila, Abruzzo, February 14, 1862 – 1947) was an Italian painter and illuminator of manuscripts (miniatore).

He was a resident of Florence. He first studied in L'Aquila, but later dedicated himself to the study of classic illumination of texts, including those in the Florentine Libraries, and set himself to imitating the antique. Among his first works was the cover of an Album, commemorating the arrival of the Emperor William II of Germany to Rome. This work was praised by the professor Niccolo Barabino of Florence. Leoni was utilized to make designs for porcelain and for documents given in memory of occasions, for example by the Società Filarmonica Fiorentina to Madame Hastreiter, after a charity concert. Cavaliere Civelli commissioned from him covers for his edition of La Vita Nuova by Dante, which he decorated on parchment, in a style from the 1500s, reproduced with chromolithography. He also completed in similar style the Canzone di Cino da Pistoia to Dante, on Death of Beatrice, offered to the queen of Italy in occasion of the centenary of Beatrice Portinari.

Other sources

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