Salvatore Fancello

Salvatore Fancello (b. Dorgali, 8 May 1916–d. Bregu Rapit, 12 March 1941) was an Italian sculptor, potter and painter.

He began his career as an apprentice in the terracotta and leather workshop of Ciriaco Piras, a local artisan who had been the student of Francesco Ciusa in Cagliari.

Salvatore Fancello, Monza, 1930 - © Archivio Ilisso

Salvatore Fancello and Costantino Nivola, Milan, 1936 - © Archivio Ilisso

In 1930, he received a scholarship that allowed him to study in Monza at the Istituto Superiore per le Industrie Artistiche (ISIA). There, he studied ceramics and won the admiration of his teachers, including Marino Marini, Arturo Martini, Edoardo Persico and Giuseppe Pagano. His fellow students included Giovanni Pintori and Costantino Nivola, and the three became inseparable friends.

Salvatore Fancello and Giovanni Pintori, Monza, mid-1930s - © Archivio Ilisso

In the 1930s, he experimented and collaborated actively in the art world, participating in exhibitions and maintaining ties with the pottery studios of Ciriaco Piras and Simeone Lai in Sardinia.

Despite some initial incomprehension, Fancello kept working and making use of what he had learned in school. In collaboration with Lai, he created the successful line Creazioni Fancello, which was also highly regarded by important buyers like the department store La Rinascente.

Simeone Lai (based on a design by Salvatore Fancello), Abbeverata, second half of the 1930s - © Archivio Ilisso

Salvatore Fancello,Cinghiali, 1937, tempera on paper, Nuoro, Archivio per le Arti Applicate - © Archivio Ilisso

Sardinia, reinterpreted through the lens of time and memories, was at the heart of Fancello’s early artistic production. Between 1933 and 1935, he created a celebrated personal bestiary on paper and in terracotta, representing the island’s fauna in an imaginative, eccentric way.

Salvatore Fancello, Mucca e vitellino, 1938 ca., glazed terracotta, Nuoro, Archivio per le Arti Applicate - © Archivio Ilisso

This exotic vision expanded to include rhinoceroses, ostriches, giraffes, elephants, anteaters, zebras and lions, right in the middle of the period of African colonialism.

Fancello’s work, which also included constellations, landscapes with female nudes and satirical vignettes published in Il Settebello, was highly esteemed across Italy. His works were often mentioned in the most prestigious magazines, like Domus, and garnered praised from authoritative critics, not least Giulio Carlo Argan.

Salvatore Fancello, Il paradiso terrestre, 1940, in Domus, n. 171 March 1942. The work belonged to Giancarlo Palanti - © Archivio Ilisso

Salvatore Fancello in the Olivetti offices in via Clerici, Milano, 1938 - © Archivio Ilisso

His career was tragically cut short by his premature death.
His work is on view in the Museo Fancello in Dorgali and in the Spazio Ilisso, Nuoro.

Salvatore Fancello

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