Salvatore: Soul of the Island
A Brush with Color and Light – Salvatore Federico
A robust and seasoned singing voice and the strum of warm guitar chords ring through the tiny artist shops that line the narrow pathway to Villa San Michele. The polished stones underfoot are shaded and cool, a welcome respite from the midday heat.
When you first see Salvatore Federico silhouetted against the Anacapri sky, you might mistake him for a much younger man, perhaps a street singer trying to make a few Euros. He stands straight, head tilted upward, singing of love, beauty, and the ocean. As you approach, he turns and smiles, still strumming and singing, and you suddenly realize he’s not young; he’s ageless.
Salvatore Federico’s tanned face reflects his 85 years in the same way an ancient Roman bust reflects the march of time. You know he’s seen a lot of life, but his smile seems carved by eternally youthful hands, reflecting a love of life undulled by the years.
He beckons you into his shop, and you immediately swim in a visual cascade of oil paintings and watercolors so vibrant that they appear to be windows into tiny worlds. Right away, you see a theme in his work: nature and the Tyrrhenian Sea in her many moods.
Anacapri, Italy
His home is in Anacapri, a less glitzy sister city to Capri, which sits in the Tyrrhenian Sea and is part of the Mediterranean off the western coast of Italy. The sea was named for the Tyrrhenian people identified with the early Etruscans of Italy. It’s a large area of water bounded by the islands of Corsica and Sardinia to the west and Tuscany, Campania, and Calabria to the north and east.
Since his youth, Federico’s been spellbound by the sea and nature. His earliest painting still hangs among his current works. The painting depicts the pale blue sea, and the deep rose pink of the dawn sky. It includes his initials FS written in bold black strokes against a candy-colored palette.
Salvatore Federico, the Artist
Besides art, Federico has the same passion for music. He’s an accomplished guitarist and composer; for him, singing is painting, and painting is singing. There is not one without the other. He’s been selling his work and singing (for free) in the same tiny shop for nearly 60 years.
Mr. Salvatore is a true Anacapri native. Born in 1936, he dresses much as he did in his youth. His signature style includes a straw hat, a relaxed Panama-style shirt, and oversize glasses. He still paints daily, occasionally working in the studio but preferring to paint en Plein air. His paintings transform the raw visual elements of the island into evocative creations that burn like an afterimage into your memory.
“I couldn’t live without painting,” he says, and indeed you’ll find him almost every day bringing the island to life on canvasses large and small or with soft watercolors or sketches in charcoal and white crayon. The Faraglioni are constant characters in his work, towering above crashing breakers or glistening azure waters so lifelike you want to dip your hand into them.
Federico Salvatore has captured the magic of nature in a way few other living artists have, and maybe that’s because he is genuinely a part of Capri, not simply an observer. His muse is always there with him, waking or sleeping; he captures her in all her moods, then shares them with the world.
