About the Artist
Giovanni Mataloni
Giovanni Maria Mataloni (1869 - 1944) was an Italian lithographer, poster artist, painter, decorator, publicist and illustrator born in Rome in a family of the nobility. The paternal family owned several paper mills in the area of Pioraco, in the province of Macerata. He is considered, together with Leonetto Cappiello, Adolf Hohenstein, Leopoldo Metlicovitz and Marcello Dudovich, one of the fathers of modern Italian poster art. His first manifesto is dated 1891, which is also when he began his career at the Ricordi Graphic Works, first as a printer and then as a poster artist. Friend of the painter Antonio Mancini and well integrated into the Roman artistic climate, in 1896 Mataloni became part of the In Arte Libertas association, in which he was listed as a painter, especially of portraits.
