Franco Fontana

(b Modena, 9 Dec 1933). Italian photographer. He began to take photographs in 1961 and had his first exhibition in 1968. Interested in the interplay of colours, he created an intensively vibrant and original language that he successfully used to explore diverse subjects, including urban landscape, portraiture, fashion, still-life and the nude. His work has been defined as intimately poised between abstraction and pragmatism, with later critics creating the label of 'Photographic Trans-avantgarde' for his style. He worked with 35 mm cameras, mostly on location: his studio, he claimed, was 'the world'.

See the Abbreviations for further details.

Fontana, Franco (b. 1933), Italian photographer, born and resident in Modena. Fontana worked as an interior designer before taking up photography c.1961. His first exhibition was in Modena in 1968. In the 1970s, while working successfully in advertising, he won international acclaim with near-abstract landscapes that transform terrain into patterns of intense colour. Later he produced equally striking nudes and cityscapes. His many books include Modena, una città (1970), Terra da leggere (1973), and Skyline (1978). In 1991 he presented his important collection of 20th-century photographs to the Modena Civic Gallery.

— Robin Lenman

Bibliography

• Franco Fontana: fotografie 1965-1987 (1987)

This entry is from Wikipedia, the leading user-contributed encyclopedia. It may not have been reviewed by professional editors (see full disclaimer)