Franco De Renzis

Franco De Renzis was born in Agnone, in the Molise region of Italy, in 1947. In 1962 he moved with his family to Pistoia, in Tuscany, where he came into contact with the painter Pietro Annigoni and the sculptor Romano Dazzi, who guided his vocation towards sculpture. He came from a family of bell founders: from his father and uncles he learned the art of bronze casting from a very young age.

He began his artistic career in 1970. In 1977 he moved to Brazil, where he lived and worked in Itapecerica da Serra (São Paulo), becoming over the years a reference figure of Italian-Brazilian sculpture. He later divided his life between Tizzana, in Tuscany, and Porto Seguro, in Bahia.

At the centre of his artistic research is man: the human body as both subject and measure, explored within the great classical tradition of Italian sculpture while remaining open to a civic and contemporary sensibility. His works, both small and large in scale, engage with public space and collective memory, and have been the subject of solo exhibitions, including "Il fuoco, il corpo, la scultura" ("Fire, Body, Sculpture"), curated by Nicola Micieli, in Pistoia in 2010.

Franco De Renzis passed away in Pistoia in August 2025, at the age of 78. His son Dimitri now carries on the family archive and atelier in Tizzana, caring for his artistic legacy and making the works that remain in the studio available to the public and to collectors.