Abstract

The convergence between the visual arts and Italian diva film has an ideal interpreter in Lyda Borelli, who drew from Symbolist and Decadent iconography in order to create her specific gestures and assert herself as a diva and artist. Her particular image is portrayed from the 1910s in many caricatures and illustrations published in reviews, demonstrating the relationship between the actress and the spectators. As such, an interdisciplinary study of Borelli's iconography allows us to analyze the importance and the influence of her original image in culture, art and cinema in XX century.