The avant-garde Wulz sisters had been queens of early experimental pictures

Even Marion’s extraordinary pictures of Trieste throughout its wartime bombardment and subsequent liberation had been taken from their third-floor terrace, the identical vantage level from which Carlo had shot the funeral procession of Archduke Franz Ferdinand and his spouse, Sophie.

They restricted their topics, too, photographing girls from town in addition to actresses, writers, dancers and painters (Surrealist Leonor Fini was one topic, as was Olympic fencer Irene Camber). Their sitters look comfy, spirited, free from the male gaze. The Wulzes created a kind of female universe inside their studio partitions, residing and collaborating with the style and textile designer Anita Pittoni, who was a good friend, utilizing the garments she created for fantastical shoots and performances as Gypsies and Egyptians, all captured by their digital camera.

Wanda Wulz, Young Woman: Signora Bosutti, 1930-1. Gelatin silver print. Florence, Archivi Alinari-Archivio Studio Wulz

Just a few portraits of the infamous misogynist Filippo Marinetti and different Futurists do exist within the archive, nevertheless it’s maybe unsurprising that Wanda’s already unfastened affiliation with the motion didn’t final lengthy. Neither she nor Marion married – and there’s no proof of lovers infiltrating their rigorously constructed cocoon of sisterhood. Instead they appear to have turned an financial crucial right into a lifelong expression of their identities as fashionable, emancipated girls. Right on.

‘Wanda and Marion Wulz: Avant-garde Photography in 20th-century Italy’ runs 16 September to twenty December on the Estorick Collection of Modern Italian Art, London. For extra data go to estorickcollection.com

A model of this text seems within the September 2026 subject of ‘The World of Interiors’. Learn about our subscription provides

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