Alessandro Duroni, optician and owner, since 1837, of a shop for physics, optics and chemistry instruments in the De Cristoforis gallery in Milan, was the author of the first daguerreotypes in Lombardy, celebrated by the newspapers of the time. He made frequent trips abroad for professional reasons and in 1848 he opened a daguerreotype factory in Milan, with a portrait studio, in the then Corso Francesco (later Corso Vittorio Emanuele II). Duroni's atelier became one of the most renowned portrait studios of the peninsula and in it the main protagonists of Italian history were portrayed, including Giuseppe Garibaldi, Nino Bixio, Camillo Benso count of Cavour, Carlo Cattaneo, King Vittorio Emanuele II . Of the latter Duroni, now adorned with the title of Photographer of His Majesty the King of Italy, he painted a full-length portrait that earned him a medal at the Italian National Exhibition of 1861. Among his most valuable daguerreotypes, the stereoscopic one should be noted and colored by hand that portrays the countess Giuseppina Durini Casati, mother of the painter Alessandro Durini.

Painter and colorist in the photography workshop opened by Felice Beato in Yokohama, Kusakabe also worked as an assistant to Baron Raimund von Stillfried. From 1881 he opened his own photographic studio, contributing with his work to the prestige that the “Yokohama School” was acquiring among Western travelers. By merging the art of reportage and views, learned from Beato, with von Stillfried's psychological approach to portrait, Kusakabe became one of the most admired photographers of his time, creating a vast archive of photographs on Japan. His work as a photographer is characterized by the manual coloring of the images, always of the highest quality, characterized by an extensive range of chromatic tones and a considerable color density. Photography is part of the rich repertoire of studio portraits collected by Kusakabe since the beginning of his activity.

J. Pascal Sebah had started his business in 1857 by opening the El Chark plant (Arabic motto which means "East") in Constantinople, together with Antoine Laroche, in the so-called "Avenue des Photographs", the Grande Rue de Péra, at number 439 next to the Russian embassy. The atelier specialized in oriental costumes, a trend in great demand by European travelers of the time, and in views, taking up some of the most representative monuments, architecture and places of the capital. Sebah's name appeared in various exhibitions, from the Universal Exhibition in Paris in 1867 to those of the Société Française de Photographie, of which he was a member, in 1869 and 1870. In 1873 he also opened a studio in Cairo and in the same year he was awarded at the 'Universal Exhibition in Vienna where, by now the sultan's official photographer, he presented an album of 42 photographs, entitled Les Costumes populaires de la Turquie en 1873, dedicated to popular "types", also widespread in the production of other photographic ateliers, such as the bearer of water, the ragman, the dervishes. Sebah's subjects are rendered without excessive artifice, given by accessories or painted backdrops. In his catalogs the views of Egypt included the tombs of the Mamluks, the pyramids, the citadel of Aswan, the temple of Abu Simbel, the valley of the Kings and all the places of major archaeological interest. For these images he was awarded at the Philadelphia Exposition of 1876 and at the Paris Exposition of 1878.

Luigi Sacchi, eclectic and lover of the arts, entered as a student at the Brera Academy of Fine Arts in 1822. He initially devoted himself to painting and then moved on to lithography and woodcut. Discovered photography in the 1940s, also thanks to an editorial activity that led him to Paris (also on behalf of Alessandro Manzoni), Sacchi became passionate about and tenaciously studied its manufacturing processes, orienting himself towards the calotype technique. He is particularly interested in works of art, architecture and archeology. Between 1851 and 1855 he designed and created the editorial work Monuments, views and costumes of Italy, a series of 100 salted papers chosen from over 300 photographs taken by him during his travels through Italy to document its artistic beauties. The perspective view that takes up the right side of the quadriportico and the facade of the basilica of Sant'Ambrogio is most likely part of the third series of the aforementioned work, dedicated to northern Italy and dated to 1854. The basilica was resumed before the restorations promoted in 1857 by the Austrian government, but carried out only after the unification of Italy. On the central arch of the narthex you can see the imperial coat of arms of the Habsburgs with the double-headed eagle, removed in 1859 after the annexation of Lombardy to Piedmont and the Kingdom of Italy.

Paolo Monti gradually approached photography starting from the 1920s, constantly expanding his skills also in relation to significant European experiences such as Subjektive Fotografie, a movement led in Germany by Otto Steinert. The years spent in Venice, where he moved to work after a first period in Milan, will be years of change for him, both for the contact with the lagoon reality and for the meetings with other photographers. In the autumn of 1947, Monti founded the photographic club La Gondola, of which he is the main animator and intellectual guide. From that moment an exemplary path opens up for him, which leads him to become one of the greatest Italian photographers. In 1953 he returned to Milan, abandoning his career as an industry manager to devote himself entirely to photography. Here he will spend his entire professional life as a photographer, dedicating himself to post-war urban changes (from the Qt8 district, to the new public housing in San Siro, to the Pirelli skyscraper), to commissioned projects - including work for the History of Italian Literature Garzanti, edited by Cecchi and Sapegno (1965), or the one for the History of Italian Art by the publisher Einaudi (1979) -, to the documentation of the Triennali and Museums of the Castello Sforzesco. He will have an important public office under the direction of Andrea Emiliani, from 1965, for an impressive campaign to survey the historical and artistic heritage of the Emilian Apennines and the historic center of Bologna. In parallel with his professional activity, he will conduct significant experimental research, measuring himself with frames, chemigrams and color materials.

Pompeo Pozzi, trained as a painter at the Brera Academy of Fine Arts, worked from 1848 in the shop inherited from his father, Luigi Valeriano, publisher and print shopkeeper. Soon he became passionate about photography, so much so that he turned it into a solid profession and dedicated himself with extreme skill to the shooting of monumental buildings and works of art. His shop was home to the art and photography magazine "L’Artista", directed by Luigi Sacchi in 1859. In 1862 he was mentioned by Antonio Caimi, in his memoir, as one of the best artists of Lombardy. He had important commissions from the Municipality of Milan, for which he photographed buildings built by the Technical Offices, and from the Veneranda Fabbrica del Duomo, which commissioned him with photographic campaigns to document the work in progress for the Cathedral. His photographs were purchased by a French diplomat and are now kept in the Bibliothèque nationale de France and the École Nationale Supérieure des Beaux-Arts de Paris. The photograph with the view of the northern side of the Duomo is a contact print from a collodion plate and is taken from the top of the building of the Portico dei Figini, not yet demolished; shows the building front, opposite the Cathedral, before the construction of the northern porticoes (1870-1874).

In addition to engravers and painters, the theme of the ancient and the monumental is also joined by distinguished artists-photographers of urban landscape: first of all the calotypists of the "Roman School" Fréderich Flacheron, Eugène Constant, Alfred Nicholas Normand, Giron des Anglonnes and the painter perspective, converted to photography, Giacomo Caneva; later famous names such as Anderson, MacPherson, Ashby, Chaufforiers, Sommer, Tuminello, Cuccioni, Altobelli and D'Alessandri, just to name a few. The photograph that documents the appearance of the Roman Forum before the excavation work, begun in 1871 by Pietro Rosa, is attributed to Tommaso Cuccioni because it is very similar to another photograph by Cuccioni of which there is an example in the collection of Dietmar Siegert in Monaco and another example in the collection of Dario Reteuna in Turin. Cuccioni was from 1830 chalcographer and merchant of prints. With the advent of photography, he first bought for his shop, in via Croce 88 and then in via Condotti 18, daguerreotype views, including those of his friend Giacomo Caneva, then, from 1852, he began to photograph in first person, specializing in the large format monumental view. He was praised at the Exhibition of the Société Française de Photographie of 1859 for the views of the Roman Forum, the Colosseum, the Laocoon sculptural group, the Arch of Constantine.

The photograph shows one of the most unique and fascinating events held at the Arena in Milan, a double nautical and fireworks show that took place on 2 August 1863, with regattas and marine hunting games, which saw women from Venice, Como and the Lake Maggiore, in a costume competition. Six other small-format prints (93x130 mm approximately) come from the same negative, useful for the photographer to guess the right exposure and contrasts. The final photographic print is therefore the result of a series of subsequent tests that allowed the photographer to identify the best shot. The construction of the great amphitheater, next to the then Piazza d'Armi, was undertaken by Napoleon I in 1805 and completed on a project by the architect Luigi Canonica in 1807. The first show staged at the Arena was organized on the occasion of his inauguration and had as exceptional spectators the emperor, the viceroy and the king of Bavaria. The Arena was flooded with water from the Euripo canal, connected to the network of canals. For many years, the Arena was followed by shows and parties, parachute descents, fireworks, famous carousels and ice events. The most successful shows, however, were the nautical ones: the fake naumachiae and the regattas.