Three new photography books explore women's stories through Francesca Woodman, Veronica Barbato, and Francesco Raffaelli

Three new books centered on women and photography have been released in Italy. Bertrand Schefer's "Francesca Woodman" (Johan & Levi, 2024) is a short novel recounting the French writer's engagement with the artist's memory, tracing her early gift of a camera from her father, her love for Jane Eyre and Nadja, her attachment to the Victorian world, and her only solo exhibition during her lifetime at Galleria Maldoror in Rome in 1978 at age twenty. Schefer interviewed Woodman's friends, learning about her eccentricities and her conceptual approach to photography, where she used the medium as a tool rather than being enslaved by it. Veronica Barbato's "Tua Sorella" (Artphilein, 2024) is a photographic book narrating the tragic story of her sister Maria, who died by suicide in 1994 at 24. Through images of Maria as a child, adolescent, and young mother, Barbato transforms them into street art to remember her, using cheerful, vibrant pictures that contrast with the sorrowful narrative spanning thirty years between the South and the province of Reggio Emilia. Francesco Raffaelli's "Fino in fondo" (Editrice Quinlan, 2024) is an artist's book in the 20×24 series curated by Roberto Maggiori, limited to 60 copies with an original image. It references Marguerite Duras's "Testi segreti" and "L'uomo atlantico," featuring black-and-white portraits of young women's faces, their eyes as light, in a work of deep observation without narrative digressions.