Gianni Cilfone (b. 1908) emigrated with his family from Italy to Chicago at the age of five. After studying at the Art Institute of Chicago, Cilfone took lessons from Hugh Breckenridge and John F. Carlson. He exhibited at the Hoosier Salon between 1949 and 1958, at the North Shore Arts Association, at the Association of Chicago Painters and Sculptors, and at the Art Institute of Chicago (1929). Throughout the Midwest, he lectured and gave painting demonstrations. In addition, Cilfone conducted sketching groups to Brown County, Indiana, a popular region of outdoor painting. Critics admired his scenes of Gloucester harbors, depictions of Vermont’s purple mountains, and picturesque views of sunny Indiana. The thick impasto in Girl on a Swing, which is almost sculptural in its aggressive application, is remarkable. The painting is a textbook example of how impressionists conceived of objects as patterns. All traces of contours have been abandoned in this totally anti-academic oil sketch.
