Michele Tripisciano

Michele Tripisciano (13 July 1860 – 21 September 1913) was an Italian sculptor.

He was born in Caltanissetta, the son of the potter Ferdinando Tripisciano and Calogera Falci. He started modelling clay when he was a child in his father's jags factory and in 1873 he was sent to study in Rome at the St Michael Ospice thanks to the involvement of the baron Guglielmo Luigi Lanzirotti and Mr Pugliese. Between 1880 and 1888 he worked with Francesco Fabi Altini and in 1884 he obtained the silver medal at the Accademia di San Luca for his work Caio Mario sulle rovine di Cartagine (Gaius Marius on the ruins of Carthage).

He lived in Rome for many years and then returned to his home town when he died at the age of 53 because of a bronchopneumonia.

In 1900, he received the Knight's Cross from king Umberto I of Italy and in 1912 he was awarded a Knight's Cross of the Order of Saints Maurice and Lazarus by Vittorio Emanuele III di Savoia.

Life and work
Tripisciano opened his own sculpting workshop and created mythic sculptures getting inspiration from both religious and historical subjects. He got orders for churches and memorials and after winning some competitions he worked on international basis.

His work, which was influenced by Francesco Fabi Altini, exemplifies neoclassicism together and with that of such contemporaries as Ettore Ximenes, Nicola Civiletti, Domenico Trentacoste and Mario Rutelli, also of contemporary Romano Vio, Francesco Biangardi, Giovanni Duprè, Luigi Fontana, Giovanni Scarfì and others.

Galleries holding his work
A museum dedicated to Tripisciano (Museo Tripisciano), located in the Palazzo Moncada on Largo Barile in Caltanissetta, displays many works, mostly stucco models, from the sculptor donated to the town. Among these is a work in marble, Orfeo. This work is different from the previous ones from the same author because of the particular introspective analysis on the subject.