[5] One of his grandfathers was a cabinet-maker, the other a maker of musical instruments, and his father taught draughtsmanship at the Istituto Tecnico of Spoleto.

He moved to Umbertide, in Umbria, and became manager of a pottery works, the Ceramiche Rometti, where he acquired valuable practical experience.

[7]: 18 [8] In 1942 he moved, without his family, back to Rome to take up a position teaching ceramics at the Istituto Statale d'Arte (now suppressed), where he would remain for ten years.

During the Second World War, after the fall of the Fascist regime in Italy, he was active as a partisan, at first in Rome, and later with the Communist Brigata Innamorati [it] in Umbria.

[5] From 1947 he was among the artists who had – at a peppercorn rent – the use of studio space in the Villa Massimo, which until it was sequestered in 1945 had housed the Deutsche Akademie in Rome.