He fulfilled his education in Rome and
Paris. He worked at Ricordi Graphic Workshop between 1912
and 1915, where he designed posters and book covers of
musical works. His most famous and oldest poster is the one
for “Cuisiničres en tous genres” in 1907, while in 1912
he signed the one for “Lenti Radio Attive”. In the field of
affiches, he devoted mainly to motion film subjects, such
as for example, the series of posters meant for “Cabiria”by
Pastrone in 1914, realized together with Metlicovitz, with
whom he established a special relationship. For the opera
he produced an interesting poster for “L’amore dei tre re”
by Montemezzi (1913). During the war he realized a series
of lively sketches, he dedicated, moreover, but without a
great success, to renovation of the ceramics from Sardinia.
He went on with his poster designer activity in the 20s,
even though he didn’t reach quite interesting results. After
some years he designed two posters with a burlesque taste
and with daring compositional technique cuts, one for
“Bitter Pastore” in 1910 and the other for “Cordial Campari.
Also the only poster realized for Mele is burlesque in
genre , but the characteristic of Caldenzano is about being
able to use different languages and tones, in contraposition
too. His great skill consisted in mixing up elements, like
in the posters for “Cabiria” till the “smothered dramatic
force” and the “funereal musicality” (R.Curci 1983)in the
poster for “L’amore dei tre re”. In addition to the
light-hearted tune and subtle irony in the posters for Mele
and Campari.
( Translation by Irene De Angelis
Curtis
)