The story of a painting by one of the major exponents of Italian Futurism is on display at Palazzo Crivelli in Milan.

Giacomo Balla’s 1942 La città che avanza (Expanding City) depicts Rome’s Lungotevere Flaminio and the Lungotevere della Vittoria under construction. “That November, after several observations, my father who always used to go and look at the river” recalls Elica Balla, “decided to paint a view of the Tiber waterfront including the recently built houses reflecting in its waters, the San Valentino hill in the background, and a crane with workers on the building site by the river. It’s the city irretrievably expanding, the poetry remains above the bright sky and in the beautiful reflections in the water; this is a very important painting because it reaches beauty in the completeness of the picture as a whole, in the magic quality of colour, while also describing our time in the ever-expanding city destroyer of rural poetry. This painting was then bought by an engineer…”.

Over the years La città che avanza journeyed through exhibitions and private collections. First in Turin in a monography in 1963, then back in Rome at the Galleria Nuova Pesa, and then in Antonello Trombadori’s private collection. From the Scuola Romana archive put together by Netta Vespignani, Balla’s painting travelled to the Milanese home of two great Italian collectors, Gina and Cesare Romiti, who scrupulously protected it for years. Today this painting is publicly displayed in all its beauty and historical value and is to be auctioned at Ponte Casa d’Aste 25 and 26 May. Now that its all-Italian tour that initiated in 1942 is coming to a close, Balla’s Expanding City is ready to meet a new exhibition space, new owners and a new audience.

Opening image: Giacomo Balla, La città che avanza, 1942, oil on canvas, in original artist's frame cm 67,5x103. Signed in the lower right corner, titled and dated 1942 on the back. Provenance Rome, Cesare and Gina Romiti Collection. Credit Il Ponte Auction House