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Lugano

Luigi Ghirri

  • Close-up of a magazine cover titled “Lei”: a smiling young woman with dark hair touches her face, surrounded by printed headlines.

    Modena, 1979
    From the series Still life

    1978
    C-print from 24 x 36 mm negative
    31 x 22.6 cm

  • A cigarette advertisement in a city street: a dark-haired woman in a white fur leans on a red sign reading “Filter cigarettes”, with building façades behind.

    (Luzern) 1971
    From the series Kodachrome

    c. 1971
    C-print from 24 x 36 mm negative
    11.7 x 8 cm

  • View through a stone archway: a statue on a plinth, seen from behind, stands against modern buildings and a pale sky, with strong shadows on the paving.

    Roma EUR, 1982
    1979-1982
    C-print from 24 x 36 mm negative
    47.1 x 32 cm

  • View through a window whose dark frame forms a large cross: pale sky and clouds above, and below a vast park with pink flowerbeds and a tiny figure

    Versailles, 1977, 1977
    C-print from negative
    37 x 24.5 cm
    Edition 6 of 80

Luigi Ghirri: Biography

Luigi Ghirri was born in Scandiano, in the province of Reggio Emilia, in 1943. Considered today one of the most significant and influential figures in contemporary photography, he began his activity in 1970, immediately adopting an approach inspired by conceptual art.

His original and thoughtful visual research soon attracted international attention: in 1975 he was included by Time-Life among the “discoveries” of the Year of Photography and participated in the exhibition Photography as Art in Kassel. In 1982 he was among the protagonists of the exhibition Photographie 1922-1982 at Photokina in Cologne, where he was presented as one of the twenty most representative photographers of the 20th century.

Beginning in the late 1970s, Ghirri intensified his exhibitions and developed a strong commitment to the cultural promotion of photography. He founded with Paola Borgonzoni and Giovanni Chiaramonte the Punto e Virgola publishing house (1978-1980), curating several editorial and photographic projects. Among the most relevant:Iconicittà (1980), Viaggio in Italia (1984) and Esplorazioni sulla via Emilia (Explorations on the Via Emilia, 1986) true manifestos of the new Italian photography.

Among his best-known series are Kodachrome (1970–1978), Atlante (1973), in which he photographed the pages of an atlas as imaginary journeys, and Paesaggio italiano. In 1989–1990 he photographed Giorgio Morandi’s studios in Bologna and Grizzana, a body of work that bridges his research with the painter he most admired.

In the 1980s he was involved in numerous public and private commissions, offering refined readings of Italian architecture and landscape, and collaborated with important architects, including Aldo Rossi, who invited him in 1985 to participate in the Architecture section of the Venice Biennale. In 1988 he curated the Photography section of the Milan Triennale.

His path of reflection on landscape culminated at the end of the decade with the publication of two fundamental volumes, …Paesaggio italiano (Italian Landscape) and Il profilo delle nuvole (The Profile of Clouds), both published in 1989 which summarize his poetic and analytical look at reality.

Luigi Ghirri died prematurely in Roncocesi, Reggio Emilia, in 1992. His work continues to inspire generations of photographers and scholars because of his unique ability to capture the intimate, symbolic and cultural dimensions of everyday space.

Luigi Ghirri and Repetto Gallery

Repetto Gallery devoted a solo exhibition to Luigi Ghirri, The Enigma of Vision (2019), with a text by Ennery Taramelli, and has presented his work in group exhibitions including Cosmic Pulses (2017), Giorgio de Chirico, in the Mirror of the Twentieth Century (2023) and Giorgio Morandi and Beyond (2025).The gallery offers a selection of vintage prints by Luigi Ghirri; please enquire for available works.

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