Ferdinando Scianna Retrospective at GAM Palermo

A major retrospective of Ferdinando Scianna, the first Italian photojournalist to join Magnum Photos, opened at the Galleria d'Arte Moderna in Palermo. Co-curated by Denis Curti, the exhibition features 180 black-and-white photographs spanning fifty years of Scianna's career, organized into nineteen sections. Born in Bagheria in 1943, Scianna published his first book, 'Feste religiose a Palermo', with Leonardo Sciascia at age 21, winning the Prix Nadar. After moving to Milan in 1967, he began his photojournalism career, later relocating to Paris where Henri Cartier-Bresson introduced him to Magnum in 1982. The exhibition covers his work as a reporter, landscape photographer, portraitist, anthropologist, and fashion photographer, including his iconic 1987 Dolce & Gabbana campaign featuring model Marpessa, which later inspired Steven Meisel's work for the brand. Scianna has published over fifty books, and the exhibition was conceived as a "mostra delle mostre" (exhibition of exhibitions), drawing from his entire oeuvre. The photographs were taken between Bagheria and the Bolivian Andes, passing through New York and India.