‘Altro Sguardo’ on the birth of photojournalism at Palazzo Braschi in Rome

More than ‘bathers’ they seem simply ‘wet’ with their clothes on the seashore: but this is how they went to the beach in 1920, as demonstrated by the photo taken by Adolfo Porry Pastorel exhibited at Palazzo Braschi together with other historical snapshots. , for the exhibition ‘Altro Sguardo’ – open from today to October 24 – dedicated to the birth in the first decade of the last century of photojournalism in Italy, organized by the Istituto Luce Cinecittà with Roma Capitale and the Ministry of Culture and curated by Enrico Menduni. The photos of costume alternate with the more political ones, inevitably – given the time – dominated by the figure of Benito Mussolini, with the Duce who threshes the wheat, the Duce who picks to demolish the ‘thorn of the Borgo’ in front of the basilica of San Peter in the Vatican, the Duce who attends the military parades, the Duce who takes the war orphans in his arms … but there is also room for the Matteotti crime and the transport of the body of the socialist leader assassinated by the fascist regime. Pastorel (1888-1960), from Veneto, photographer at the ‘Messaggero’ and at the ‘Giornale d’Italia’, is considered the father of Italian photojournalism, with his photographic agency with the prophetic name ‘Vedo’: Visioni Editoriali Diffuse Ovunque ‘; will be the teacher of Tazio Secchiaroli and the father of all the ‘paparazzi’ and eyewitnesses of the facts, told ‘live’ with images that still today, more than a thousand pages, have the power to tell an era. Enzo Bonaiuto)