ROME.- A decade after the death of celebrated photographer Elisabetta Catalano (1944–2015), Rome’s MAXXI – National Museum of 21st Century Arts – is commemorating her legacy with a focused exhibition, Elisabetta Catalano. The Lens on Artists. The show offers a heartfelt tribute to a woman whose camera shaped the visual identity of contemporary Italian art.

The exhibition brings together sixteen prints, both vintage and contemporary, recently added to the museum’s collection through the 2023 Strategia Fotografia public program, supported by Italy’s Ministry of Culture. Though modest in scale, the display feels expansive in spirit: each photograph opens a window onto the creative pulse of the late 20th century, capturing not only faces but the atmosphere of an entire artistic era.

Catalano was known for her unique approach to portraiture—a blend of quiet psychological depth and an unmistakable sense of creative energy. Her photographs reveal the joy and tension of artistic creation, depicting figures at moments when thought and gesture coalesce into vision. With her attentive, empathetic eye, she documented the defining voices of her time, becoming herself a cultural witness whose images helped construct the visual memory of contemporary art.

Among the many artists who stood before her lens were Carla Accardi, Alighiero Boetti, Enzo Cucchi, Francesco Clemente, Gino De Dominicis, Luciano Fabro, Marisa and Mario Merz, Michelangelo Pistoletto, and Lawrence Weiner—a testament to her central place within the art world’s inner circles.

The exhibition pairs Catalano’s official portraits with contact sheets from the Elisabetta Catalano Archive, allowing visitors to trace her meticulous working process. Each frame reveals an intimate choreography of exchanged glances, subtle adjustments, and mutual trust. It is in these quiet, concentrated encounters that her most enduring images emerged.

For MAXXI, the show also marks an important expansion of its holdings. Catalano is already represented in the museum’s collection with portraits of Gilbert & George, vintage prints donated in 2019, and five artist portraits held in the Architecture and Contemporary Design Photography Collection. The newly acquired works deepen this presence, reaffirming her role as one of Italy’s most significant photographic voices.

Presented in collaboration with the Elisabetta Catalano Archive, the exhibition stands as both a celebration and a rediscovery—a reminder of an artist who captured the soul of an era with clarity, empathy, and enduring elegance.