Home >> Art in Need >> What can I help restore now? >> Greta Garbo by Titina Maselli >> A self-portrait of sorts?
Maselli's evocative photograph recalls her rendition of Garbo.
A self-portrait of sorts?
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The resemblance between Greta Garbo's gaze and that of Titina Maselli is nothing short of striking. In the 1970s, Maselli moved to Paris where she gained international fame, thanks in part to a Berlin-based exhibition and one at the Grand Palais. By the mid-seventies, she would try her hand in theater-set design. Despite her long and prolific career, she was never recognized in Italy as she had been abroad. Indeed, a story by her longtime friend Carlo Cecchi illustrates this point. Cecchi was a director for whom she had designed theater sets for plays by Shakespeare, Beckett and Ibsen. He recounts a conversation with their mutual friend novelist Elisa Morante as follows: "We were coming out of a Trattoria near Piazza del Popolo, and Morante said, 'Let's get a coffee at Rosati's and then, go to see Titina's show.' When I answered, 'Titina who?' she made one of her unforgettable scenes, 'She is the greatest female painter in the country… and you don't know her. That's what you get for being a woman artist in Italy.'"