He studied drawing at the Italian Argentine cultural society, the Societá Nazionale de Buenos Aires, and in 1889, he traveled to Rome, where in 1891 he was accepted into the Accademia di San Luca, the National Academy of Fine Arts.

[2] These successes encouraged him to transition to Post-impressionism, a genre which had not yet found favor among Argentine art patrons, and he joined the Nexus Group in 1907.

The group, led by painters Fernando Fader and Martín Malharro, and sculptor Rogelio Yrurtia, braved initial ostracism and helped popularize the genre locally.

Collivadino was named director of scenography at the renowned Colón Theatre and remained head of the Academy of Fine Arts and taught there until his retirement in 1935.

Collivadino served as the director of the Pueyrredón School until 1944, when he was forced to retire by the new military regime of General Pedro Pablo Ramírez (a dictatorship whose cultural policy was hostile to European influences, in favor of what it described as "criollo virtues").