Architettura Spirituale (Duomo of Milan), 2020

50x35cm

Giovanni Gastel (1955-2021) was born in Milan. His career as a photographer began towards the end of the 1970s, when Gastel, still very young, spent many years doing an apprenticeship, taking pictures and learning the basic techniques of a profession that would later lead him to success.

The turning point of his career came in 1981 when he met Carla Ghiglieri, who became his agent and brought him closer to the world of fashion: in 1982, he began collaborating with Vogue Italia and then with Mondo Uomo and Donna.

Between the 80s and 90s, Gastel's career in the world of fashion exploded along with the "Made in Italy" trend. Gastel developed advertising campaigns for the most prestigious fashion houses including Versace, Missoni, Tod's, Trussardi, Krizia, Ferragamo. His work also took him to Paris - where in the 1990s he worked for Dior, Nina Ricci, Guerlain, as well as in the UK and Spain.

Although his career began in the fashion world, Gastel quickly understood that his also needed to express himself in projects with purely artistic intents. He quickly established himself as an artist and, in 1997, the Milan Triennale dedicated a personal exhibition to him curated by the great art critic, Germano Celant. The exhibition launched Gastel as one of the photographic elite and his name appeared in specialized magazines alongside the big names in photography such as Oliviero Toscani, Giampaolo Barbieri, Ferdinando Scianna, Helmut Newton, Richard Avedon, Annie Leibovitz and Jürgen Teller.

Professional success opened the door to another side of Gastel's photographic repertoire: portraits. In later years, Gastel became passionate about this area of photography, fully immersing himself in it. His work culminated in an exhibition at the Maxxi Museum in Rome in 2020 with a selection of 200 portraits that portray the faces of people from the world of culture, design, art, fashion, music, entertainment and politics that Gastel met during his 40-year career. Some of the notable portraits include Barack Obama, Ettore Sottsass, Catherine Deneuve, Monica Bellucci, Roberto Bolle, and Marco Pannella.