The Italian-born Carlo Pellegrini was known as a talented painter in oil and tempera of snowy landscape scenes in his native northern Italy. A move to the Swiss Alps saw Pellegrini develop into a popular illustrator of postcards and posters extolling the excitement of winter sports such as skiing and ice skating. His reputation as an admired painter of sporting scenes led him to participate in the 1912 Olympic Games in Stockholm, where he became the first man to win an Olympic Gold Medal for Painting. Carlo Giovanni Battista Pellegrini was born on 25 October 1866 in Albese (known today as Albese con Cassano) in the Como region of Lombardy, Italy. As a young man he indulged in his interest in art by drawing from life, before moving to Milan to study painting at the Accademia di Belle Arti di Brera. As a young man, Pellegrini exhibited regularly in solo and group exhibitions across Northern Italy, including at the Brera Biennale, where he became an honorary member in 1897.
In 1900, Pellegrini moved to Switzerland, first to Geneva, where he worked as an artistic advisor in the publishing house Vouga & Co, and then to the village of Adelboden in the Swiss Alps.
Here, he established a reputation as a skilled painter of snowy landscape scenes, particularly featuring sporting activities such as skiing and skating. Many of these sporting scenes were reproduced as postcards and posters designed to promote tourism.
Perhaps the most significant event of his career occurred in 1912, when Baron Pierre de Coubertin, President of the International Olympic Committee, invited Pellegrini to participate in the arts competition at the 1912 Stockholm Olympic Games. These were the first Games to hold art competitions, with medals awarded in five categories: architecture, literature, music, painting and sculpture. Carlo Pellegrini won the gold medal for painting, becoming the first man to win an Olympic medal for painting. Artistic competitions remained a part of the Olympic Games until 1948, but were discontinued due to concerns about amateurism and professionalism. The work for which he won the gold medal, entitled Winter Games, was a large triptych comprised of three wall friezes. The whereabouts of the original artwork is unknown and it was possibly destroyed in a major fire at the Vouga & Co. publishing house in Geneva, where chromolithographs had been produced.
In 1917, Carlo Pellegrini returned to his hometown of Albese, where he continued to paint the surrounding landscapes. He died there on 5 September 1937.
