Giacomo Favretto

Giacomo Favretto grew up in his father's workshop. Domenico Favretto was a carpenter in Venice, with a large and poor family, and the story told about his son's beginnings is that he was found in a stationer's shop, cutting out paper silhouettes to earn a living. In 1864 he entered the Venice academy of fine arts, where his teachers included the painter Pompeo Marino Molmenti, and he stayed on there as an assistant teacher.

In 1877, before he was 30, he lost the sight of one eye. He went on painting the life of the city around him, its streets, shops and crowds. His Vandalism of 1880 is in the Brera in Milan, and one of his last subjects was the Liston, the Venetian name for the stroll across Saint Mark's Square.

He died in Venice on the 12th of June 1887, at 37, in the year the city hosted Italy's national art exhibition, where his paintings were on show.