Emilio Sommariva - Lina Cavalieri

This is an extraordinary portrait executed by the renowned Milanese painter and photographer Emilio Sommariva, certainly to be counted among the greatest Italian portraitists, famous for his shots of Lina Cavalieri, perhaps the subject of this beautiful photograph, and of Lyda Borelli, Elena Makowska, Anna Fougez and many other actresses, singers, and women of show.

Emilio Sommariva is still regarded today as one of the foremost portraitists in the history of Italian photography, who captured in splendid portraits the greatest actresses of the 1910s and 1920s, as well as figures from European politics and culture, and this one for sale now is certainly among the most significant and poignant of all those created by this great photographer.

This image features this beautiful woman, perhaps Lina Cavalieri, almost “dreamlike,” a classic studio photograph, a portrait executed with Sommariva’s usual mastery, and the print appears to be a carbon print, with a slight sepia toning, on cardboard.

The photograph is vintage, authentic to the 1920s, the format is truly “giant”—39.4 x 29.7 cm—and the preservation conditions are really excellent. Stamp of Emilio Sommariva on the back, with pencil annotations.