Gabriele Basilico. Roma

The Museo Nazionale Romano in Palazzo Altemps hosts a prestigious exhibition dedicated to the great photographer of urban landscapes, on the occasion of the 80th anniversary of his birth.

Curated by Matteo Balduzzi and Giovanna Calvenzi, the exhibition celebrates Gabriele Basilico's extraordinary photography, presenting, for the first time in an organic way, his most important research about Rome, in dialogue with the museum's spaces and artworks. 

The famous Milanese photographer, who died in 2013, was deeply connected to the Eternal City: during his career, Basilico assiduously visited Rome, receiving between 1985 and 2011 twenty professional assignments for numerous photographic campaigns.

The exhibition path, specially conceived for the halls of Palazzo Altemps, winds through two main sections, connected by a space, considered as the exhibition's beating heart, and depicts a monumental and contemporary city, which the photographer accurately and sometimes spectacularly portrays from unprecedented and surprising points of view. On display are fifty-six works from the 1980s to the most recent ones - in black and white and colour - accompanied by more than 250 original proofs from the famous photographer's archive: from photos portraying rationalist architecture, the coexistence of civil and monumental architecture of the Roman times, and the different aspects of the Colosseum, to 60 original sheets of contact proofs with selection marks and notes, showing the creative process of the seven main projects realised about Rome, up to a selection of more contemporary and monumental works and the course of the Tiber, the only colour work closing the exhibition. 

Gabriele Basilico. Roma is presented by the Directorate-General for Contemporary Creativity of the Ministry of Culture, in collaboration with Museo Nazionale Romano - Palazzo Altemps, MUFOCO - Museo di Fotografia Contemporanea and the Basilico Archive.

Photo: Roma, 2007 © Gabriele Basilico/Archivio Gabriele Basilico