Abstract

The paper focuses on Giovanni Gargiolli (Fivizzano, Tuscany 1838-Rome, 1913), one of the most important Italian photographers of the Nineteenth century. In 1888 he founded in Naples the first photographic association of Italy. In 1895 he created the famous National Photographic Laboratory (Gabinetto Fotografico Nazionale) in Rome, specializing in photographic views of works of art and historical monuments, launching its first Catalogue in 1903. Gargiolli continued his work and began travelling around Italy for new photographic campaigns, and he was an irreplaceable point of reference for preserving, cataloguing, circulating and handing down, through the photograph, the history and the art of Italy.