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Tullio Farabola (Milano, 8 October 1920 - Milano, 11 December 1983) was an Italian photographer.

Tullio Farabola photographer in Milan
Tullio Farabola was born in Milan, and took up photography following in the footsteps of his father Alessandro detto Giuseppe.

Giuseppe Farabola was born in Milan on december 12, 1885, attended the “Accademia di Belle Arti di Brera” and the “Scuola d'Arte Applicata del Castello Sfrozesco”, obtained the diploma of “Specialized Photograph Retoucher”. He started working as photographer in 1896 in Milan. In 1911 he co-founded a photo studio with A. Bressani in C.so Ticinese 87 in Milan. A few months later Bressani withdrew and Farabola remained the sole owner of the studio. For many years he was the official photographer of the Archiepiscopal Curia of Milan. Photographed in his studio famous sposrtsmen, took passport photos, portraits and groups. He married with Ambrogina Zanardi on April 22, 1909, had two children, Ada in 1910 and Tullio in 1920. He stop the activity in 1954 and died in Rapallo on April 13, 1967.

Tullio Farabola began working with his father in 1939. During World War II he attended a course in war cinematography at the “Istituto L.U.C.E.” in Rome. Here he met Afolfo Porry Pastorel, the father of Italian photojournalism, founder in 1908 of the “Agenzia VEDO”, an italian photographic agency, who will become a model for him. In 1943 he came back to Milan where documented historical facts from 1943 to 1945: the German occupation, the last speech of Mussolini, the effects and victims of the allied bombing (the photo of the children who died in the school of Gorla in 1944 became famous), the liberation with the the Germans who leave the city and the leaders of the Committee of National Liberation who parade with the partisans through the streets of Milan on April 25, 1945. After the war he went back to work taking the road of the photojournalism, creating the photo agency “Farabola” based in C.so Ticinese 60 in Milan. In the postwar period he photographed the difficulties of the city exhausted by bombing and hunger, the black stock market, the dormitories, the ”Cucine Ecomomiche”, the boys imprisoned in the “Beccaria” juvenile prison, the revolt in the San Vittore prison led by Ezio Barbieri, the raids of prostitutes, the clandestine gambling dens, the attack on Togliatti, then finally the reconstruction of the city, from the Scala to the Galleria Vittorio Emanuele, the return to the life of the citizens, the return of Toscanini, the first outdoor dances, the first signs of the economic boom, entertainment, sport, fashion.

In those years photojournalism grew considerably due to the freedom of information regained after 20 years of dictatorship. The crime story, prohibited during Fascism, caused a sensation. In 1946, following a crime story, the murder by Rina Fort of her lover's wife and children, the photo of the murderess sleeping on a sofa in the police station was published in the main newspapers and weeklies, causing a sensation and giving Tullio Farabola notoriety. The models that inspired Tullio Farabola were Adolfo Porry Pastorel and the American photojournalists The photographs from the period 1943 - 1960 are the most dramatic and effective and those that best represent his style.

Soon Tullio Farabola takes care of the development of the photographic agency rather than his activity as a photojournalist. He carries out an intense photographic activity in the studio, creating covers for the most popular popular weeklies of the time (Oggi, Gente, Radiocorriere TV), album covers (Renato Carosone, Fred Buscaglione) and black and white portraits of characters from the world of culture and entertainment (Salvatore Quasimodo, Eugenio Montale, Riccardo Bacchelli, Indro Montanelli, Giorgio De Chirico, Juliette Gréco). It can be said that in the 1950s and 1960s for a character from the world of entertainment, art or sport, going to Farabola for a photo shoot was a confirmation of success. The agency made use of valid collaborators: Franco Gremignani, Lucio Berzioli, Sergio Del Grande, Sergio Bersani, Alberto Guarnerio, Eros Biavati, Settimio Garritano, Angelo Cozzi, Pietro Pascuttini. The studio photos were the result of teamwork. Lucio Berzioli was a property finder and had a flair for finding furniture, clothing and other objects that were used to set the images. The style of the black and white portraits was inspired by Yousuf Karsch, while the record covers were inspired by great American advertising photographers  who made large format slides (8”x10”), which was unusual in Italy.

At the same time the historical photographic archive, one of the most complete and best organized in the country, was organized. On the occasion of the twentieth anniversary of the italian declaration of war, in 1960, grew the interest of the press in the images of fascism and war. Later, given the interest of the market, the archive was supplemented by acquisitions of material from other archives. The first important acquisition was the archive of the VEDO Agency of Adolfo Porry Pastorel, which took place in the mid-1950s. Later the archives of Mario Agosto, photographer of the “Italia” Navigation Company (transatlantic liners Conte Grande, Rex, Andrea Doria, Michelangelo and Raffaello), of the portraitists Artuto Ermini and Attilio Badodi, of Giuseppe Felici, (photographer accredited to the Holy See from 1920 to 1970) were acquired. In 1960 photographs of World War II were acquired from foreign agencies and  were published in the main Italian weeklies. The initiative was very successful and led to enrich the historical archive. Images of the two world wars were purchased from the archive of the Imperial War Museum in London. It was the first photographic material of the Second World War to be imported into Italy. It included aerial shots of the RAF with bombed cities. In Berlin an exchange was made between Italian photos of fascism and German photos of Nazism. Thus were acquired the photos of Hitler taken by Heinrich Hoffmann, some photos of Manfred von Richthofen (the "Red Baron"), of Göring, the inflation story of the Weimar republic and other photos of great historical interest. The creation, development and management of the historical archive was largely handled by Alberto Crivelli, collaborator of the agency since 1948 and director of the same from the death of Tullio Farabola until 1990.

The activity of Tullio Farabola has been documented by numerous publications which focus mainly on news photos and on the historical archive, but there is no publication dealing with the activity carried out in the studio.

Some images from his archive are still visible on the A.F. Archivi Farabola, whose activity is aimed at the recovery, conservation and digitization of his images.