At the Museo di Roma in Trastevere the retrospective dedicated to Philippe Halsman, great 20th century portraitist

The Museo di Roma in Trastevere presents from July 6, 2023 to January 7, 2024 the exhibition Philippe Halsman. Flash of Genius, dedicated to Philippe Halsman, one of the most original and enigmatic portrait painters of the 20th century. Curated by Alessandra Mauro, the exhibition is promoted by Roma Capitale, Assessorato alla Cultura, Sovrintendenza Capitolina ai Beni Culturali and is organized by Contrasto and Zètema Progetto Cultura, in collaboration with BNL BNP Paribas and Leica Camera Italia. The catalog is published by Contrasto.

Philippe Halsman signed 101 LIFE covers; he created portraits extraordinary for their strength and psychological excavation; with Salvador Dalí he invented images as true performance art. Among the greatest portrait photographers in the history of photography, he was always able to work between gaze and introspection, immediate intuition, flashes of genius and refined technique. This first Italian retrospective exhibits a previously unseen selection of his photographs and celebrates his work with a series of images made with irony and profound lightness.

On display at the Museo di Roma in Trastevere one hundred images of various formats, from theHalsman Archive in New York, ranging between color and black and white, trace his entire career. This is a unique opportunity to get in touch with his great creations, to understand what the creative key of his images is: halfway between document and invention, as it is precisely in the tradition of the great portrait painters who are asked to interpret the subject by making him emerge, or hide, behind his character even at the cost of inventing a particular, very personal form of photographic document. Photo after photo, in the exhibition we enter Halsman’s universe, in a visual game between the photographer, the personality to be portrayed and the viewer. As Halsman stated, “The end result is another surface to penetrate, this time through the sensitivity of the viewer. It is indeed up to him to decipher the elusive equation between the sheet of photographic paper and the depth of the human being.”

Through the photographer’s images, we reconstruct the faces of twentieth-century culture and entertainment. Born in Riga, Latvia in 1906, Halsman began his career as a photographer in Paris in the 1930s, working for magazines such as Vogue and Vu. In the 1940s, at the height of the war and thanks to the friendship of Albert Einstein, he obtained a visa for the United States and, once he landed in New York, his reputation as a great portrait photographer was further consolidated. From collaborations with major newspapers to intense portraits for Hollywood show business, Halsman created a unique and revolutionary genre and style. His photographs are the result of a volcanic creativity and the synergies that are sparked by encounters with great and distinguished friends. Such as Salvador Dali, with whom he creates a series of portraits in which the artist and the photographer merge making an extraordinary series of images. All lend themselves to Halsman’s ’game,’ to be photographed in a studio, with lights, backdrop and cumbersome machinery. Halsman also invents a method to amuse and surprise his subjects: he makes them jump in front of the lens. Thus was born “jumpology,” a game with which he managed to make people jump from Marilyn Monroe to the Dukes of Windsor, inaugurating a whole new way of photography.

This exhibition will be realized in accordance with the principles of sustainability with the goal of being carbon neutral. The curators and organizers of Philippe Halsman’s exhibition decided not to neglect this aspect. Neutralia, the partner chosen to lead the measurement and offsetting activities, will apply methods in line with national and international regulations and will give the organizers both correct tools to measure and then offset the impact of the carbon footprint that will be generated, as well as advice on how to adopt virtuous methodologies for future installations.

For info: www.museodiromaintrastevere.it

Hours: Tuesday through Sunday from 10 a.m. to 8 p.m. Last admission one hour before closing.

Single ticket including admission to the Museum and Exhibition for the amount of € 8.50 full and € 7.50 reduced, for non-residents; single ticket including admission to the Museum and Exhibition for the amount of € 7.50 full and € 6.50 reduced, for residents.

Free and reduced for the categories envisaged by current pricing. Free admission to the museum for MIC Card holders.

Image: Dalí Atomicus, with Salvator Dalí, United States, 1948 © Philippe Halsman Archive 2023 / image rights of Salvador Dali reserved Fundacio Gala - Salvador Dali

At the Museo di Roma in Trastevere the retrospective dedicated to Philippe Halsman, great 20th century portraitist

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