Gaetano D'Agata

Gaetano D'Agata (1883-1949) was an Italian landscape photographer, mainly active in Taormina, Sicily, before the Second World War. He is notable for having produced a volume of nude photographs of men and boys in art poses.

He traveled to Ireland, Spain, India and the United States, where he also opened a photographic studio in New York, which remained open only for a year. D'Agata returned to Sicily and, from 1900 to 1910, became an assistant to Wilhelm van Gloeden. The collaboration may have continued past 1910 since some later photos signed by D'Agata are set in the garden of van Gloeden.

Around 1914, D'Agata opened his own photographic studio, which from stamps on the back of his photos was on Corso Umberto (the most important street) of Taormina.

D'Agata had greater success as a "postcard" landscape artist, and many of his "genre" photos were used for postcards that remained in circulation for several decades: Sicilian carts, Etna erupting, the Greek theater, native Sicilian people. His production was aimed at satisfying the demand for "genre" scenes requested by the general public and prints of his images had mass distribution, of which tens of thousands of examples survive. In this field D'Agata turned out to be a good commercial photographer, technically up to his job and the market he had chosen. This production also received prizes, as revealed by the fact that its postcards are signed "Premiata Fotografia d'Arte G. D'Agata".

Between 1920 and 1930, D'Agata had a less successful production of artistic male nude photos. In these, however, D'Agata's efforts to imitate in the style of von Gloeden is too literal, harming the overall result, depriving it of originality.  Having had a limited education, D'Agata lacked the cultural and artistic background possessed by von Gloeden, and the only references available to him were those of von Gloeden's photography. Thus, D'Agata's photography of male nudes moves substantially within the imagery created by von Gloeden. For example, D'Agata's most famous male nude is nothing but a palpable imitation of one of Gloeden's most popular images, Cain. On the other hand, the technical aspect of these photographs is exceptional, revealing the true hand of a professional. This last fact guarantees good prices for the rare images of D'Agata that appear on the antique market.