Description

Bernardo Hay (Florence, 1864 – 1931)

Marina Grande in Capri

Material: Oil on canvas
Dimension: 46 x 77 cm
Frame: Yes

About the Artist:

Bernardo Hay was born in 1864, the son of Jane Benham Hay, a British painter living in Florence at the time. His mother was one of the pioneering figures of the Pre-Raphaelite movement in England. She had been separated from her husband, the painter William Hay, for some time at the time of the child’s birth, so he could not be considered the father. The mother then married the Italian painter Francesco Saverio Altamura, who belonged to the Macchiaioli group of artists and with whom she had been in a romantic relationship since the late 1850s.

Bernardo Hay studied painting with Altamura in Naples. In the early 1880s he lived briefly in Venice, Florence and Bruges. In 1883 he participated in the annual art exhibitions in Milan (with four paintings: Field of Flowers, Summer in Posillipo, and Two Views of Venice) and Rome (View of the Grand Canal, the city of Bruges, and a view of the Belgian countryside). Around 1885, he exhibited in Turin (Portrait of Carmanella, Spring Flower and Seascape of Resina). He returned to Naples in the late 1880s and thereafter produced mainly views of scenes and people around the Gulf of Naples. In 1889 he was still living in Naples and later moved to Capri.

In addition to the few known views of Bruges and Belgium, landscapes of the Gulf of Naples were among the artist’s favorite subjects, as were portraits of the ordinary Neapolitan population. He also painted several views of Venice. Only oil paintings of Hay are known. Information about the artist’s death varies from 1931 in Capri to 1934 in Naples.