Born on May 17, 1925 in Larino (Molise - Italy), Paolo Di Paolo moves to Rome immediately after the war and enrolls a course of History and Philosophy at La Sapienza University. He becomes close to the Roman art scene, in particular with the Forma 1 artists, developing his interest in the figurative arts through the photographic medium. His debut as a photographer takes place as an amateur, meaning “photographing for pleasure”.
In 1954 his first photo is published in the cultural weekly Il Mondo directed by Mario Pannunzio, in which, until the newspaper closes in 1966, Di Paolo is the most published photographer. Between 1954 and 1956 he collaborates with La Settimana Incom Illustrata and in the same period he begins a long-term partnership with the weekly Tempo, which lasts until its closure. Numerous reportages are signed with the most successful journalists of the time. As an Envoy, he travels to the Soviet Union, Iran, Japan, the United States, as well as across Europe.
Thanks to the friendships established in the cinema and the art world, he creates private and exclusive photos of the greatest intellectuals, artists, actors and directors of the time; he’s mostly focused on documenting the society and people, reporting the changes from post-war to the “economic boom”. He concludes his photographic career in tandem with Irene Brin, a well-known costume journalist, focusing on fashion assignements and jet-set reportages. With the advent of television and the paparazzi, the closure of many newspapers and the gossip-oriented press, in 1968 Paolo Di Paolo decides to stop taking photographs and to devote himself to studies, curating as historian and graphic designer editions for the Arma di Carabinieri Corps.
The archive, with over two hundred thousand negatives, will remain hidden for half a century. The MAXXI Museum in Rome in 2019 exhibits its first exhibition, the important retrospective "Lost World - Photographs 1954-1968". Photographer and cinematographer Bruce Weber directed and produced the documentary-film on Paolo Di Paolo "The trasure of his youth" (2021).
In 2021 the Sozzani Foundation in Milan presented the exhibition: The long road of sand, photographs by Paolo Di Paolo with texts by Pier Paolo Pasolini (reportage signed by the two authors, published in the summer of 1959). In 2022/2023, on the occasion of the centenary of the birth of Pier Paolo Pasolini, the Italian Ministry of Foreign Affairs, with the collaboration of the Italian Cultural Institutes Abroad, promoted the circulation of the exhibition which was exhibited in the museums of: Lisbon, Copenhagen, Rio de Janeiro, Santiago de Chile, Tel Aviv, Mexico City, Quebec.
In May 2023, the Faculty of Literature and History of Art with a specialization in Philosophy at La Sapienza University of Rome awarded him an Honorary Degree, celebrating him as the most important Italian photographer of the twentieth century.
Paolo Di Paolo passed away on 12 June 2023 in Larino at the age of 98.