Paparazzi: Photographers and Stars: From the Dolce Vita to the Present

Published on the occasion of the great exhibition staged at CAMERA - Centro Italiano per la Fotografia - this volume retraces the history and legend of ‘paparazzi’.

‘Paparazzi’ is a photographic and cultural phenomenon born during the years in which Rome was considered ‘Hollywood on the Tiber River’. The 120 images portray the features of the protagonists of that season - especially the divas and stars of the silver screen, in addition to the photographs illustrating the wild nights in Via Veneto between the 1950s and 1960s. Photos by Tazio Secchiaroli, Marcello Geppetti, Elio Sorci, Ron Galella and many other prominent figures of the time make up (together with pages out of the magazines in which they were published) a fresco of popular communication from back then. Once the heroic season of paparazzi came to an end, that language became a sort of code used in different artistic and commercial contexts, as demonstrated in the final part of the volume by the images of the leading names in today’s photography scene such as Alison Jackson, Armin Linke and Ellen von Unwerth.

Text in English and Italian.