Gualtiero Nativi, Combination of Forces, 1951, Tempera on Board

Gualtiero Nativi (1921-1999) participated in post-war avant-garde movements: in 1945, together with Bruno Brunetti, Fernando Farulli, and the poet Alberto Caverni, he founded the revolutionary cultural journal *Torrente*. During that period, the same group that had gathered around the *Torrente* magazine launched the innovative *Arte d'Oggi* movement—of which Gualtiero Nativi was a key figure—and established the eponymous magazine (1947). In 1950, alongside Vinicio Berti, Bruno Brunetti, Alvaro Monnini, and Mario Nuti, he signed the *Manifesto dell'Astrattismo classico* (Manifesto of Classical Abstraction), launching the movement of the same name. Although short-lived, the Florentine Classical Abstraction group—linked to the *Arte d'Oggi* circle—had a major impact on the culture of the time, much like the contemporary Roman *Gruppo Forma 1*; the movement explicitly declared a Marxist ideology. Florentine Classical Abstraction advocated for "a rigorous geometric purism, to be contrasted with certain lyrical outcomes of abstraction."

Following the dissolution of the Classical Abstraction group, Nativi became a member of the Paris-based *Groupe Espace* in 1953.

Gualtiero Nativi's work evolved from an abstract style—characterized by the rhythm, dynamism, and originality of his pieces from the 1940s and 1950s—towards an increasingly defined compositional rigor in subsequent decades; this rigor, a hallmark of Florentine Classical Abstraction, became both extreme and allusive. Enrico Crispolti identified in Gualtiero Nativi’s work "a quest for supreme poise in the construction of relationships, balances, forms, and elements within space. It reflects an intense will and capacity for control—evident in the arrangement of forms and chromatic values—that expresses a rational rigor, a focus, and a moral quality extending beyond the boundaries of the artwork itself".

Gualtiero Nativi won numerous awards, including the *Premio del Golfo* in La Spezia (1950), the *Premio Città di Pontedera* (1957), and the *Premio Acquisto* from the Ancona Provincial Tourism Board at the *Premio Marche* (1960).

Since his death, the archiving of his work has been managed by his son Berto and the Galleria Nozzoli in Empoli, which oversees the publication of the *Catalogo Generale* (General Catalogue).