Moda in luce 1955-1975. Roma fra glamour e innovazione industriale

A journey through the layers of a myth, exploring cinema, style and the imagination. Organized by Archivio Luce Cinecittà in collaboration with the Ministry of Culture, and promoted by Roma Capitale, the Department of Culture and the Coordination of initiatives linked to Holocaust Remembrance Day, the exhibition at the Capitoline Museums - Centrale Montemartini guides visitors on a journey of discovery through a decisive phase in the establishment of “Made in Italy”. It does so by celebrating an extraordinary period for Rome, when the city become the undisputed star of haute couture and a leading centre for cinema, television and style.

The exhibition is the second chapter of the “Moda in Luce 1925-1955” exhibition, held in the halls of Palazzo Pitti in Florence. It focuses on the twenty-year period from the economic boom to the 1970s, recounting the birth of the myth of Italian fashion on the sets of Cinecittà, the so-called “Hollywood on the Tiber”. The exhibition immerses visitors in 150 period photographs, almost all from the Luce Historical Archive, depicting fashion shows, ateliers, interviews, behind-the-scenes film footage and photo reports: a visual journey through the Rome of La Dolce Vita, punctuated by the faces of legends from the worlds of fashion and entertainment, such as Sophia Loren, Audrey Hepburn, Liz Taylor, Lucia Bosè, Kirk Douglas, Charlton Heston, Sean Connery, Elsa Martinelli, Anita Ekberg, Anna Magnani, Ingrid Bergman and Rod Steiger.

Five video stations show footage that is often rare and has not been available to the public until now. The exhibition is rounded off, alongside objects, documents and fabrics, by 27 original fashion masterpieces – most of which have never been seen before – designed by some of the biggest names in fashion, such as Valentino Garavani, Karl Lagerfeld for Fendi, Sorelle Fontana, Fernanda Gattinoni, Roberto Capucci, Renato Balestra, Pino Lancetti and Laura Biagiotti. The exhibition design, conceived by architect Dario Dalla Lana, recreates the style and colours of an elegant Roman tailor’s shop of the era and culminates in a library room housing some precious textile swatches from the archives of Mantero Seta, Taroni and the Ermenegildo Zegna Group, as well as rare books and magazines belonging to the curator Fabiana Giacomotti, a scholar of costume and fashion publishing from its very beginnings.