The Sanremo Festival has just ended. It is certainly much more than a music competition: it has now become the television event of the year with record share. The enormous media resonance is measured by the number of talk shows, articles and debates ranging from gossip to music criticism.

From 1951 to the present day, the Festival has become to all intents and purposes a symbol of our culture and renews the celebration of Italian music every year.

The majestic stage of the Ariston theatre has seen the most important artists perform and has become a milestone in the careers of many singers, including one of the most famous icons of the music scene: Anna Maria Mazzini, aka Mina.

Mina made her debut at only 20 years of age in 1960 at the Sanremo Festival. Her unmistakable voice immediately won over the public and critics.  A year later the singer returned to Sanremo with the song ‘Le mille bolle blu’, an extraordinary success that became one of the symbols of her career. Her voice, sensual and powerful, drove the hearts of Italians wild. But the real consecration came in 1962, when Mina won the Festival with ‘Non ho l’età’, a song that would become the symbol of an era and a musical revolution. 

Today we want to show you a shot of Mina taken in the 1960s by photographer Tazio Secchiaroli commissioned by the editor of the magazine Il Mondo – Mario Pannunzio. The photograph of Mina captures the essence of the singer by highlighting her strong stage presence. 

The photograph is now part of the Mario Pannunzio Photographic Collection now kept at the National Central Library in Florence. The photo library, consisting of around 20,000 photographic prints, was the subject of a major Reconditioning and Digitisation project coordinated and executed by our team. The project involved several professionals who worked in strong synergy, creating a close-knit and enthusiastic team, although heterogeneous in nature, and successfully concluded the project.

National Central Library of Florence for the collection of its Pannunzio Fund with Il mondo contemporaneo. Preservation of the Photographic Archive of Mario Pannunzio’s Magazine is the Bncf’s winning project in the Photography Strategy 2023 Call for Proposals in the field of Conservation and Valorisation. The project is supported by the PAC2024 – Plan for Contemporary Art, promoted by the General Directorate for Contemporary Creativity of the Ministry of Culture.

This project has made it possible to preserve and make accessible to the public this important Photographic Collection.

The past lives on in the present, enriching the understanding of our musical and visual heritage.