Much of Alitalia’s, the Italian flag carrier’s, 20th-century art collection of Alitalia SpA was sold at auction for Euros 1.2 million ($1.8 million) last week. The painting, “Zeus Gave Birth to the Sun” by Gino Severini, pictured above, did not go at auction. It was expected to fetch around half-a-million euros and was ordered by the Italian government as part of the Alitalia bankruptcy proceedings.
In all about 200 pieces of modern Italian art sold for about 20 percent more that the predicted auction value. The Severini painting was the item with the highest estimated value. The work was commissioned by Alitalia back in 1954 for its Paris offices.
This are collection was amassed over time as the airline supported local artist to decorate its global offices. Most of the artwork was painted during the regulated-airline days of the 1950s and 1960s. Many of these paintings were real frequent fliers. They were hung in jets that winged their way across the Atlantic and to Africa and the Middle East.
In the brief, sweet heyday of the jet age, if you were lucky you might have boarded a plane equipped with a cozy lounge and bar, where you joined the other handsomely dressed passengers around a piano with your mai tai for a rendition of “Fly Me to the Moon.”
But in the 1960s, Alitalia took this idea of in-flight elegance a step further, furnishing its first-class cabins with small paintings from its sizable Modernist collection.
Surprises at the auction were prices paid for Italian Futurist paintings by more obscure artists like Lucio Fontana, known for his slashes on canvas (left), Giacomo Balla, Francesco Lo Savio, Carla Accardi and Enrico Prampolini.
Paintings by Futurist artists such as formed the bulk of the art sold, while select works by Italian artists Francesco Lo Savio and Carla Accardi also enjoyed considerable success, the auction house said.
Today, Alitalia is headquartered in Rome and operates services to 25 domestic and 48 international destinations in 37 countries across Africa, the Americas, Asia and Europe. It is the world’s 19th largest passenger airline by fleet size.
Charlie Leocha is the President of Travelers United. He has been working in Washington, DC, for the past 14 years with Congress, the Department of Transportation, and industry stakeholders on travel issues. He was the first consumer representative to the Advisory Committee for Aviation Consumer Protections appointed by the Secretary of Transportation from 2012 through 2018.
