Mario De Biasi (Sois, Belluno, 1923 - Milan, 2013) began taking pictures between 1944 and 1945 in Germany, where he was deported during the war. Returning to Milan, his adoptive city, in 1946, he began working as a radio engineer and dedicates his free time to photographs that he takes on the streets of the city. In 1948 he approaches the Milanese Photographic Circle, where in December he organizes his first exhibition, but after disagreements with some members of the group he cuts ties with the club. In the spring of 1953 he was hired by the weekly Epoca and thus became the first photographer to have a steady job on the staff of an Italian magazine. He stayed at Epoca for more than thirty years and there he met Bruno Munari. Their friendship will lead De Biasi to illustrate some of the famous designer's books with photos of him. At that time he made a series of reportages on unknown Italy, published in installments under the title Journey to Italy and The Italy we don't know. He soon became a foreign correspondent: on 23 October 1956 he left for Hungary, where he documents the popular revolt and Soviet repression. This reportage will be published all over the world in dozens of magazines in Italy and abroad, giving De Biasi the right reputation as a photojournalist. In 1955 he published his first photographic book, Idea di Milano, published by Arnoldo Mondadori. In December the Municipality of Milan awarded him his highest honor, the Ambrogino d’oro; in 2006, on the occasion of the fiftieth anniversary of the Hungarian Revolution, the dramatic photos taken in Budapest in 1956 were published in a monographic book and exhibited first in Budapest and then at the European Parliament in Strasbourg. In 2003 he was awarded the title of Master of Italian Photography, the highest honor of the Italian Federation of Photographic Associations, which the same year dedicated a monograph to him and, a few weeks before his death, the AIF Award for his career was dedicated to him. Among the main exhibitions of Mario de Biasi: The Italian Metamorphosis, 1943-1968, Guggenheim Museum in New York, USA (1994-95); Mario De Biasi. A photographic journey * (2004), Italian Cultural Institute of Los Angeles, USA; * Mario De Biasi. Changing Japan 1950-1980 (2011), Japan Camera Museum in Tokyo, Japan.
