Marilyn Monroe: An Appreciation, an exhibition featuring photographs by Eve Arnold, is now on display at Opificio Della Fotografia in Milan until August 31.
“An exclusive exhibition from the Eve Arnold Estate that offers an intimate portrait, which escapes the multiplicity of gazes to focus on a single relationship, prolonged over time … The Milan exhibition stems from a question: why do we continue to look at Marilyn Monroe? What are we looking for when we look for her face?
‘Marilyn Monroe was a body that worked, suffered, laughed, waited; she was never just an image.’
Federicapaola Capecchi’s curatorial response stems from a mythological intuition: Marilyn Monroe is a Proserpina [Persephone] for our time. The goddess who spends half the year in the world of the living—luminous, desired, omnipresent, eternal spring—and the other half in the afterlife. Like Proserpina, Marilyn was also abducted: by the cinema, by the male gaze, by the image industry, by her loves. Created by the system as a goddess of light and sunshine, she was simultaneously swallowed up by the same system in darkness: psychological fragility, addiction, isolation, and death at thirty-six.
Her public image is one of eternal spring. Her real life descended into hell. It’s perhaps no coincidence that her last film is called The Misfits and was shot in the Nevada desert: a parched landscape, a land of slow death. It’s there, in that desert, that the exhibition finds its deepest and truest core.
The exhibition doesn’t claim to ‘liberate’ her from this fate. It has the clarity to make it visible, restoring complexity where there has too often been only icon.
The 40 photographs on display are the fruit of a decades-long relationship … Eve Arnold saw Marilyn work, wait, laugh, break down, and get back up. She photographed her in dressing rooms and airport bathrooms, on the set of The Misfits, and in the parks of Bement, Illinois. She had the wisdom to never turn anything into judgment. Her images are simply close. No hagiography, no cruelty.
‘There is a woman who looks at another woman with the patience of one who knows that truth is not grasped in an instant, but is constructed over time, without a safe distance, without heroism.'”
This follows another exhibit at the Milano Cultural Centre, Bye Bye Baby: 100 Years of Images, which closed on June 12. (The poster shows Lawrence Schiller’s photo of Marilyn while shooting the ‘pool scene’ from the unfinished Something’s Got to Give.)
“A century after Marilyn Monroe’s birth, what remains of her image? The answer is not immediate, because her image continues to elude, multiply, and reinvent itself. The exhibition addresses this complexity, offering the public a multifaceted and diverse portrait, through the eyes of photographers and artists who immortalised her many faces. From the radiant smile of the young pin-up girl portrayed by André de Dienes and Tom Kelley, to the fragile and vulnerable woman captured by Eve Arnold, to the intense and contradictory shots of Bert Stern’s The Last Sitting—a poignant testimony to the end of an icon.
The exhibition composes a veritable mosaic of gazes, a play of reflections in which Marilyn is never simply herself, but becomes projection, desire, and cultural construction. If photography played a decisive role in her rise, cinema is where Marilyn Monroe becomes legend. Reminding us of this are the original posters, playbills, and vintage covers that serve as an indelible reminder of the magnetic and ambiguous Marilyn … transforming the centenary into an opportunity to question, once again, who Marilyn Monroe really was.”
The red sequinned stilettos worn by Marilyn for ‘Two Little Girls From Little Rock’ (the opening number from Gentlemen Prefer Blondes) went on display at Salvatore Ferragamo‘s flagship store in Florence last month, as well as a white pair from Marilyn’s personal collection.
Meanwhile in Rome, How to Marry a Millionaire is showing tonight at 9:30 pm at Casa Del Cinema – with Some Like It Hot to follow on Sunday, June 21.
“On June 1, 2026, Marilyn Monroe would have turned 100. The Casa del Cinema is celebrating the anniversary with a series of films that made her immortal …
How to Marry a Millionaire is a classic screwball comedy, enhanced by the pioneering use of Cinemascope and a trio of irresistible stars such as Marilyn Monroe, Betty Grable and Lauren Bacall.
The festival will close with a screening of Billy Wilder’s Some Like It Hot, a wild and unpredictable comedy featuring a stellar ensemble cast including Marilyn Monroe, Jack Lemmon, Tony Curtis, George Raft, and Joe E. Brown.”
Marilyn also graces the cover of Cineforum‘s June edition, with a classic 1953 portrait by Frank Powolny leading a twenty-page tribute.
And on a musical note, Vinile magazine has released a tribute compilation, Some Like It Blonde. (The cover artwork combines a 1954 photo by Baron with Marilyn’s star on the Hollywood Walk of Fame.)
“To mark the 100th anniversary of Marilyn Monroe’s birth, a collectible vinyl record celebrates the icon who conquered Hollywood and the world. The album also includes the famous ‘Happy Birthday Mr. President’ song, as well as an exclusive 12-page illustrated booklet dedicated to the great artist’s career. An unmissable release for enthusiasts and collectors.”
And finally, two more Monroe classics are coming to Giunti Odeon in Florence…
THE SEVEN YEAR ITCH: June 22 – “François Truffaut claimed that this is Billy Wilder’s most wicked and scandalous film. Scandalous because of the sexual innuendos, and wicked because the male cuts a sordid figure, consumed by his erotic passions and steeped in petty-bourgeois vice. Marilyn, the embodiment of a male dream, is nevertheless too beautiful, cunning, and brilliant for him. A dream that surpasses the dreamer.”
THE MISFITS: June 29 – “It is the era in which Marilyn seeks controversial support for her mental decline in Paula Strasberg, Lee’s wife and a teacher at the Actor’s Studio; Montgomery Clift, though in a somewhat limited role, is magnificent in his aged innocence (amidst some Oedipal issues). Arthur Miller writes for a wife he is leaving, and Russell Metty delivers breathtaking cinematography.”
The Marilyn Report 