Feminist icon, alcoholic and compulsive streaker, Amedeo Modigliani, was born in the Italian town of Livorno, or Leghorn as it's known to the British (though he probably preferred to think of it as Legover). His mum was an alternative type who ran an experimental school and encouraged kids to question the status quo, which is probably why big brother ended up in clink for anarchy while Amedeo sprinted off to Florence to join the Free School of the Nude (tut tut, other people's children).
In 1906 Amedeo hit Montmartre to further his creative career but spent so much time off his face on drink and drugs and spontaneously becoming starkers that he had to stagger back to Livorno to recuperate. When he returned to Paris he took up sculpture using stone he swiped from building sites. He later began a loving relationship with writer Beatrice Hastings, pausing only to demonstrate the depth of his feelings by throwing her out of a window (perfectly acceptable, he was an artist).
Having given up sculpture due to a shortage of swipeable stone and personal clout, Amedeo expended his remaining energies on knocking the daylights out of his new live-in other, Jean Hebuterne, whilst enthusiastically painting her between the boxing and bonking bouts. They had a child but her dad got so pickled on his way to register her that he was never officially recognised as such. When his stupendous paintings finally began fetching decent dosh, Modigliani celebrated by 'O.D'ing on booze and sardines. Two days later, with the dipso' defenestrater no longer around to assist, Jean obligingly threw herself out of a window (it's what he would have wanted ). Yes, just a typical week's plot-line from Brookside.
