For the first time Paolo Morello’s extraordinary collection will be on show at a public exhibition. These series of vintage prints drawn from the collection cover the history of Italian photography from the post war years through to the mid seventies.

This was a period when Italian photography reached an all time pinnacle of social awareness; when, in the years immediately following the war, television had yet to gain the upper hand and information was conveyed through the illustrated press (therefore, through photography).
Furthermore, it was precisely during this period that a younger generation first began to consider photography as a professional activity. This new osmosis between photography enthusiasts and professional photographers yielded results that would never again be matched.
These were crucial years in Italian history moreover, and photography was the most capable medium in portraying not only the rapid transformation our society underwent during the years defined as the ‘economic boom’, but also a value system which still today identifies Italian culture throughout the world.

The exhibition, curated by Alessandra Mauro and Paolo Morello, presents 250 vintage prints, masterpiece from leading Italian photographers active between the fifties and sixties. In all about thirty authors, including Gianni Berengo Gardin, Carlo Bevilacqua, Paolo Bocci, Piergiorgio Branzi, Giuseppe Bruno, Alfredo Camisa, Calogero Cascio, Elisabetta Catalano, Carla Cerati, Vittorugo Contino, Mario Cresci, Francesco Carlo Crispolti, Mario De Biasi, Toni Del Tin, Mario Dondero, Ferruccio Ferroni, Mario Finocchiaro, Caio Mario Garrubba, Mario Giacomelli, Mario Lasalandra, Giorgio Lotti, Pepi Merisio, Giuseppe Möder, Paolo Monti, Federico Patellani, Tino Petrelli, Vittorio Piergiovanni, Franco Pinna, Marialba Russo, Antonio Sansone, Tazio Secchiaroli, Elio Sorci.

The exhibition will focus particularly on some series of exceptional value, such as Venezia by Gianni Berengo Gardin, Budapest 1956 by Mario De Biasi, Forma di donna by Carla Cerati, Giudizio and Storia di un dramma by Mario Lasalandra and Cronotopi by Vittorugo Contino.

Paolo Morello has taught History of Photography in several Italian universities (Palermo, Milan’s Cattolica, Bologna and Venice); in Milan he established and directed the Course in History and Management of photography, the first European two-year master devoted entirely to photography; he is director of the Istituto Superiore per la Storia della Fotografia and, since 2001, is Contributing Editor of the periodical “History of Photography”. He is the author of numerous volumes on Italian photography of the nineteenth and twentieth centuries, as of 2009 he lives and works abroad. At present he is working on History of Photography 1839-2000 and on the foundation of a Museum of Italian Photography, destined to house the collection of masterpieces of which the present exhibition at Forma offers a limited but significant example.