Umberto Bottazzi
Born in Rome in 1865, he was self-educated, except for a brief period at the Open School of Life-drawing in Rome.
Bottazzi’s debut came when he participated in a number of exhibitions of the Society of Admireres and Protectors of the Fine Arts (1900, 1907, 1908) at which he showed his drawings.
He was an eclectic artist, working as an architect (the “Modern cottage” on the Bank of the Tiber in Prati is his work), painter, decorator, engraver and illustrator for magazines such as “Emporium”, “Fantasio”, “Nuovissima”, “La Grande Illustrazione” and “La Casa”.
It is in the illustrations for this last magazine that his adherence to the language of Symbolism, Art Nouveau and the Viennese Secessionists becomes evident.
His most famous pipeces of stained glass were shown during the two exhibitions of the Artistic Stained Glass of Rome; in 1912 “The Tulips”, “The Swans” and “The Butterflies”, three works inspired by moderism.
Right until the last years of his life, he had a scholarly interest in the events and urban history of Rome, publishing in the “Capitolium”, the journal of the Governorship, which exhibited a collection of his works in 1933.
He died in Rome in 1932.
