Marianna Cappelli

Marianna Cappelli was born in Naples and approached photography by attending the courses of Giuliana Traverso. She has taken part in editorial projects and is among the winners of the Costa Foundation Award in Genoa and the international M.I.L.K. Photos Award, chaired by Elliott Erwitt. In 2006, she won second prize at the International Illustration Competition in Bordano (UD).
She later worked in theatre while simultaneously engaging in fashion photography. Her works have been published in Vogue Gioiello, Vogue Pelle, Photo, Fotopratica Private, Zoom, Marie Claire, Soprattutto, and Sposabella. She has exhibited at the International Photography Biennale in Turin, at the Triennale Palace in Milan, GAM Turin, the Sormani Library in Milan, and in numerous solo and group exhibitions in Italy and abroad.

She conducts photography and reading workshops in schools and libraries throughout Italy. A member of the association “Donne Fotografe” (Women Photographers), she has exhibited in various contexts, including Palazzo Reale in Milan (summer 2021), Bologna (2022) with Scolpite, a photographic reflection on female statuary, and Ferrara (May 2022) with Il viaggio (The Journey).

In 2023, she presented Cupo incanto (Dark Enchantment) in Puglia and Emilia, a project exploring childhood and its magical, secret language — its fears, anxieties of change, and growth. The images are dominated by the child’s physical and expressive movement in discovering the world, while the often-lowered point of view mirrors the child’s perception.

The title of the work comes from a description that the writer Anna Maria Ortese — a Roman author who lived for thirty years in Naples — once gave of that city.