Franco: Australian Renaissance Man
1979
Oil on canvas, 170 x 130cm (Detail)
Pio Carlone was born in Bari, Italy in 1939. After he graduated from Bari Institute of Arts, in 1962 he moved to Florence and studied Set Design at the Academy of Fine Arts.
In 1966 he graduated from the Academy. The flood in Florence of the same year forced him to move to Rome. There he started his career as a painter and set designer and meeting masters like Caputo, Muccini, Quattrucci , Turcato.
In the early Seventies he took part in several group exhibitions and solos shows in prominent art galleries of Rome and, later, in France, Germany and USA. In Rome, he designed posters and sets for actor-director William Berger at Teatro De’Servi, and for Academy Award Roberto Benigni.
In 1976, Pio was invited to hold a one man exhibition at Holdsworth Gallery in Sydney. The astonishing beauty of Australia inspired him to establish himself in Sydney and, in 1979, he obtained the Australian citizenship.
The Sydney Harbour, the Pacific Ocean, the Australian Desert, Still Lives and Female Nudes, are the main subjects of his work.
He lives and works in Sydney.
