Martina
Bacigalupo

Martina Bacigalupo

biography

Italian photographer born in 1978, member of the VU’ Agency since 2010, she is based in Paris (France), after having lived 10 years in East Africa.

After studying literature and philosophy in Italy, then photography at the London College of Communication, Martina Bacigalupo moved to Burundi in 2007. As a committed photographer, she works on human rights issues, particularly on the place of women in the Global South, collaborating with various international organizations (Médecins sans Frontières, Save The Children, Handicap International, Care International, the United Nations, Comité International de la Croix Rouge…. )

Martina Bacigalupo’s photographs, through their pure framing and accuracy, develop life stories with subtlety: without demonstration, without assertion, without judgment. “In a very clear, voluntary way, Martina Bacigalupo’s work is part of a tradition, both human and aesthetic, of commitment (…) This is reflected in a careful, precise choice of themes and issues on which she exercises an empathetic gaze, always focusing on the human dimension and seeking the right distance from her subjects. This distance is difficult to maintain and must combine modesty and proximity, discretion and highlighting of the problems treated. Because it is always a question of making complex situations readable and even obvious” (Christian Caujolle).

Back in France in 2017, she continued her documentary work. Marked by the migration issues, and after several trips on the Mediterranean Sea, notably aboard the rescue vessel Aquarius, she questions the representation of migrants with The Reverie project – a multimedia project developed with Sharon Sliwinski, a Canadian researcher in Information & Media studies.

Involved in the transmission of her know-how and the defense of documentary photography, she conducts professional internships in France and abroad, socio-artistic interventions and occasional collaborations with universities.

Photo director of the French magazine 6 MOIS since 2018, Martina Bacigalupo is part of the World Press Photo Jury in 2020.

Regularly published in the international press, her work has been awarded prestigious prizes such as the Amilcare Ponchielli Grin Award in 2009, the Canon Woman Photojournalist Award in 2010 and the FNAC grant for creative work in 2011. Her series “Gulu Real Art Studio“, published by Steidl in 2013, was exhibited at the Walther Collection Project Space in New York in 2013, at Paris Photo, Unseen Fair and Rencontres d’Arles 2014 as well as at the Triennale di Milano in 2016, and integrates the Artur Walther Collection as well as the Donata Pizzi Italian Photography Collection.

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Series

I’m Showing You – How Big The Sky Is, 2025

Série| This series is a tribute by Martina Bacigalupo to her former nanny Chiou Taur Wu, a Taiwanese woman who lived for more than three decades in Italy. 

In Sea, 2018

Series | The migratory line Libya – Italy is the most lethal one in the world, 3% of deaths in 2016. Over than 180.000 refugees have reached the Italian coasts, leaving behind them around 4500 persons left who lost their life trying to get to it.

Wana Watiti, Early Marriages in the Comoros, 2015

Série| Comorans are still bounded to a conservative and patriarchal tradition according to which a girl can’t date a boy without exposing herself to a dishonour that can only be washed away by marriage even if she is under 18.

The Missing, Uganda, 2015

Series | During the civil war that ravaged northern Uganda between 1987 and 2008, thousands of children were kidnapped and forced into the LRA rebellion. Their families continue to wait and hope for their return.

Gulu Real Art Studio, 2014

Series | A series of portraits found in the trash bin of the “Gulu Real Art Studio,” the oldest photographic studio in Gulu, Northern Uganda.

Vietnam, Children of the Plateau, 2012

Series | In developing countries, diseases linked to pregnancy and birth delivery are the second cause of mortality (after HIV) for adult women.

Burundi, Places of Memory, 2012

Series | Martina Macigalupo and Iwacu journalist Roland Rugero have travelled during several month throughout Burundi’s places of memory. Places charged with traumatising memories, often hidden or not talked about in public. Places where massacres, coup d’état and civil war have happened.

Batwa, Self-Portraits, 2012

Series | A small photographic studio in a small house for travelers run by nuns. The members of the Batwa community living there are invited to come and take pictures of themselves with the camera's self-timer.

Filda, 2012

Series | The story of the daily life of a woman from the Gulu district that shows the suffering of the people of northern Uganda. The story of a silent and admirable resistance.

Wanawake, Being a Woman in Congo, 2011

Series | Every minute in the world a woman dies of childbirth. 99% of these women live in developing countries. More than half of them live in sub-Saharan Africa.

Somalia, Mogadiscio, 2011

Series | On the 06th of August 2011, Islamist militia Al-Shabaab retreat Mogadishu, living a city wounded by two decades of civil war.

The Backyard Women, Burundi, 2010

Series | In Burundi, "the backyard disease" is obstetric fistula, a lesion caused by complicated and unassisted childbirth that physically and socially condemns the women who suffer from it, who are rejected by society and their families.

Umumalayika, 2010

Series | Bujumbura, Mother and daughter, two Burundian women face disability together.

Pianissimo, 2009

Series | Pianissimo is an inward journey. Because it’s world far from noise and external things, and because I have tried to approach without invading, but silently partaking. Pianissimo, in fact.

I’m Showing You – How Big The Sky Is, 2025

Série| This series is a tribute by Martina Bacigalupo to her former nanny Chiou Taur Wu, a Taiwanese woman who lived for more than three decades in Italy. 

In Sea, 2018

Series | The migratory line Libya – Italy is the most lethal one in the world, 3% of deaths in 2016. Over than 180.000 refugees have reached the Italian coasts, leaving behind them around 4500 persons left who lost their life trying to get to it.

Wana Watiti, Early Marriages in the Comoros, 2015

Série| Comorans are still bounded to a conservative and patriarchal tradition according to which a girl can’t date a boy without exposing herself to a dishonour that can only be washed away by marriage even if she is under 18.

The Missing, Uganda, 2015

Series | During the civil war that ravaged northern Uganda between 1987 and 2008, thousands of children were kidnapped and forced into the LRA rebellion. Their families continue to wait and hope for their return.

Gulu Real Art Studio, 2014

Series | A series of portraits found in the trash bin of the “Gulu Real Art Studio,” the oldest photographic studio in Gulu, Northern Uganda.

Vietnam, Children of the Plateau, 2012

Series | In developing countries, diseases linked to pregnancy and birth delivery are the second cause of mortality (after HIV) for adult women.

Burundi, Places of Memory, 2012

Series | Martina Macigalupo and Iwacu journalist Roland Rugero have travelled during several month throughout Burundi’s places of memory. Places charged with traumatising memories, often hidden or not talked about in public. Places where massacres, coup d’état and civil war have happened.

Batwa, Self-Portraits, 2012

Series | A small photographic studio in a small house for travelers run by nuns. The members of the Batwa community living there are invited to come and take pictures of themselves with the camera's self-timer.

Filda, 2012

Series | The story of the daily life of a woman from the Gulu district that shows the suffering of the people of northern Uganda. The story of a silent and admirable resistance.

Wanawake, Being a Woman in Congo, 2011

Series | Every minute in the world a woman dies of childbirth. 99% of these women live in developing countries. More than half of them live in sub-Saharan Africa.

Somalia, Mogadiscio, 2011

Series | On the 06th of August 2011, Islamist militia Al-Shabaab retreat Mogadishu, living a city wounded by two decades of civil war.

The Backyard Women, Burundi, 2010

Series | In Burundi, "the backyard disease" is obstetric fistula, a lesion caused by complicated and unassisted childbirth that physically and socially condemns the women who suffer from it, who are rejected by society and their families.

Umumalayika, 2010

Series | Bujumbura, Mother and daughter, two Burundian women face disability together.

Pianissimo, 2009

Series | Pianissimo is an inward journey. Because it’s world far from noise and external things, and because I have tried to approach without invading, but silently partaking. Pianissimo, in fact.

I’m Showing You – How Big The Sky Is, 2025

Série| This series is a tribute by Martina Bacigalupo to her former nanny Chiou Taur Wu, a Taiwanese woman who lived for more than three decades in Italy. 

In Sea, 2018

Series | The migratory line Libya – Italy is the most lethal one in the world, 3% of deaths in 2016. Over than 180.000 refugees have reached the Italian coasts, leaving behind them around 4500 persons left who lost their life trying to get to it.

Wana Watiti, Early Marriages in the Comoros, 2015

Série| Comorans are still bounded to a conservative and patriarchal tradition according to which a girl can’t date a boy without exposing herself to a dishonour that can only be washed away by marriage even if she is under 18.

The Missing, Uganda, 2015

Series | During the civil war that ravaged northern Uganda between 1987 and 2008, thousands of children were kidnapped and forced into the LRA rebellion. Their families continue to wait and hope for their return.

Gulu Real Art Studio, 2014

Series | A series of portraits found in the trash bin of the “Gulu Real Art Studio,” the oldest photographic studio in Gulu, Northern Uganda.

Vietnam, Children of the Plateau, 2012

Series | In developing countries, diseases linked to pregnancy and birth delivery are the second cause of mortality (after HIV) for adult women.

Burundi, Places of Memory, 2012

Series | Martina Macigalupo and Iwacu journalist Roland Rugero have travelled during several month throughout Burundi’s places of memory. Places charged with traumatising memories, often hidden or not talked about in public. Places where massacres, coup d’état and civil war have happened.

Batwa, Self-Portraits, 2012

Series | A small photographic studio in a small house for travelers run by nuns. The members of the Batwa community living there are invited to come and take pictures of themselves with the camera's self-timer.

Filda, 2012

Series | The story of the daily life of a woman from the Gulu district that shows the suffering of the people of northern Uganda. The story of a silent and admirable resistance.

Wanawake, Being a Woman in Congo, 2011

Series | Every minute in the world a woman dies of childbirth. 99% of these women live in developing countries. More than half of them live in sub-Saharan Africa.

Somalia, Mogadiscio, 2011

Series | On the 06th of August 2011, Islamist militia Al-Shabaab retreat Mogadishu, living a city wounded by two decades of civil war.

The Backyard Women, Burundi, 2010

Series | In Burundi, "the backyard disease" is obstetric fistula, a lesion caused by complicated and unassisted childbirth that physically and socially condemns the women who suffer from it, who are rejected by society and their families.

Umumalayika, 2010

Series | Bujumbura, Mother and daughter, two Burundian women face disability together.

Pianissimo, 2009

Series | Pianissimo is an inward journey. Because it’s world far from noise and external things, and because I have tried to approach without invading, but silently partaking. Pianissimo, in fact.

Multimedia

Interviews

Broadcast “Sur le vif”
—
Interview by Brigitte Patient, 21 September 2024

An interview with Martina Bacigalupo by Brigitte Patient to mark the release of her latest boo “I am showing you how big the sky is” published by Editions l’Artière.

Listen to

Broadcast “Places of Memory”
—
Interview by Cyril Sauvenay, 2013

Interview in French of Martina Bacigalupo by Cyril Sauvenay for her exhibition “Places of memory”.

Listen to

Broadcast “Mon oeil !”
France Culture
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Interview by Amaury Chardeau, 2012

Martina Bacigalupo’s fate decided to lead her to Burundi, in the Africa of the Great Lakes, five years ago. The rest is a question of attention to the other, and of encounters, like the one she had one day in Uganda with Filda Adoch.

Listen to

Broadcast “7 milliards de voisins”
RFI
—
Interview by Emmanuelle Bastide, 2011

Interview with Martina Bacigalupo, on the occasion of her exhibition presented at the VISA pour Image.

Listen to

Exhibitions

Gulu Real Art Studio
–
11 au 13 septembre 2015
–
SI Fest 2015

More information

Je m’appelle Filda Adoch
–
14 juin au 13 juillet 2015
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Exposition anniversaire : les 25 ans de la collection du Centre Méditerranéen de la Photographie, Bastia, France

More information

Gulu Real Art Studio
–
13 juin au 31 août 2014
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Festival Portrait(s) 2014, Vichy, France

More information

books

Gulu Real Art Studio

Steidl / The Walther Collection - 2013

Gulu Real Art Studio

Steidl / The Walther Collection - 2013

Gulu Real Art Studio

Steidl / The Walther Collection - 2013

Awards

Fnac grant for creative assistance (France)

For her project on “Maternal Health in the South”

2011

Canon Female Photojournalist Award (France)

 

For her reporting project “Uganda: The resistance of the forgotten”

2010

Amilcare Ponchielli Grin Award (Italia)

For her subject ” Umumalayika”

2009