The Novice (Il novizio)
SEE IT IN PERSON
● On view now — Collection Gallery, Room 10, West Wall
Barnes Foundation, Philadelphia · verified July 2026
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FROM THE BARNES FOUNDATION’S CATALOG
Afro Basaldella was an Italian painter active mainly in Venice and Rome. He employed a semiabstract, openwork version of cubism in The Novice , whose title may refer to a newcomer to a religious order, an academic discipline, or a type of craft. This image is representative of Afro's syntheses of cubism with metaphysical mysticism during the late 1940s (a mode of painting that he called "abstract-surrealism"). The display of The Novice amid paintings by Picasso, Braque, and de Chirico alludes to some of Afro's inspirations and artistic affinities.
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