The following was written and compiled by Jean Ershler Schatz, artist and researcher from Laguna Woods, California:Francesco Clemente was born in Naples, Italy, the only child born to prosperous parents. His father was a judge, and he recalls his upbringing as "solitary". A self-taught painter, he began making art at the age of eight and became involved with contemporary art in Rome in the late 1960s. In 1970 he moved to Rome to study architecture, then left school and spent much of the decade traveling in India and Afghanistan with friend and early mentor Alighiero Boetti, an artist associated with the Arte Povera movement and Alba Primicieri, whom he subsequently married. Much of his time in the 70s was spent...