Mario Giacomelli

The exhibition dedicated to Mario Giacomelli, one of the foremost photographers of the twentieth century, celebrates a period in which photography achieved an unprecedented level of poetic and expressive autonomy.

Curated by Bartolomeo Pietromarchi and Katiuscia Biondi Giacomelli, the exhibition unfolds at the Centro Saint-Bénin in Aosta through a distinctive visual language of contrasts and deliberate dissonances.
Giacomelli’s “magical realism” transcends the neorealist approach that characterized much of Italian photography, enriching it with an intimate, tactile form of expressionism.

The works on display originate from real-life settings—such as nursing homes, seminaries, and rural life—but move beyond visible reality to become deeply personal, interior visions.
Rather than following a chronological order, the exhibition presents the key themes of Giacomelli’s artistic research, creating connections and visual dialogues that span his entire career.

Visitors can explore more than 150 works, including vintage prints, proof prints, manuscripts, and documentary materials such as handwritten texts and poems. Among the artist’s most celebrated series is Io non ho mani che mi accarezzino il volto (I Have No Hands That Caress My Face), dedicated to young seminarians. Here, Giacomelli’s intense black-and-white imagery conveys an overwhelming sense of tenderness.

His exploration of matter and mark-making transforms landscapes into bold experiments that verge on abstraction, revealing the ambiguity and complexity of the human condition.

Organized by Electa in collaboration with the Archivio Mario Giacomelli, the exhibition offers a compelling portrait of an artist who, starting from his hometown of Senigallia, earned a place in the permanent collections of some of the world’s most prestigious museums, including the Museum of Modern Art (MoMA) in New York.