Maria Vittoria Backhaus

At the CAVALLERIZZA – Center for Italian Photography, from April 11 to June 8, 2025, as part of Archivi, the 8th edition of the Brescia Photo Festival, the Municipality of Brescia and the CAVALLERIZZA – Center for Italian Photography will present a focus on Maria Vittoria Backhaus.

The exhibition, curated by Margherita Magnino and Carolina Zani, is dedicated to Maria Vittoria Backhaus, a pioneer of female photography. Her career, which began in 1964, took her into the world of publishing, collaborating with prestigious magazines such as Tempo Illustrato, ABC, and Il Mondo. Her interest in still life and fashion photography marked the next step in her career, solidifying her style, characterized by irony, refined stories, remarkable aesthetic sense, and revolutionary creativity.

This exhibition aims to provide a full insight of Maria Vittoria Backhaus’s work, through one hundred photographs that trace her artistic journey—from the early black-and-white shots related to reportage and fashion, to the introduction of color and digital photography. The themes she explored range from 1960s Milan to the circus, dog shows, photo stories, and portraits of famous personalities such as Caterina Caselli and Carla Fracci. The exhibition also includes her work in fashion, jewelry, and collages featuring votive statues, showcasing her extraordinary versatility and constant desire for experimentation that defined her work.

The space aims to be a cultural hub available to the entire community, particularly the younger generations, where exhibitions, photography workshops, and cultural activities can be organized, focused on the enhancement and promotion of photographic art, with a specific emphasis on Italian photography.

The “Antonio Amaduzzi” library, one of the most important collections in Italy entirely dedicated to photographic publishing, with over 3,000 books, catalogs, and series that tell the story, paths, and key figures of this expressive form, will also be made available and accessible in the building on Via Cairoli.

The building will remain open to the public six days a week, thus allowing access to a historic and valuable property, which has recently undergone a significant restoration intervention.

Full: €8.00
Reduced: €5.00 (students under 26; over 65)
Free of charge: under 18, persons with disabilities + free accompanying person, licensed tourist guides, journalists and
publicists (upon presentation of the Order’s membership card)

The ticket can only be purchased on site.