The never published before photos
discovered by Ulrich Blanché, curator of Illegal. Street art graffiti 1960–1995
were taken in 1979 by Franco Marinai,
printmaker and principal of TWO CENTS PRESS

Franco Marinai was born and raised in Florence.
After receiving a doctorate in Political Science, in 1978 he moved to New York City where he turned to filmaking doing experimental Super8 and 16mm showing them in all the mythical venues of the so-called New York no-wave cinema and internatioinally. He won several awards (First Prize at the AnnArbor Film Festival, Jerome Foundation, New York Foundation for the Arts) but in 2004 dropped filmaking to embrace printmaking and to poroduce artist’s books in limited editions.

A few years ago he started Two Cents Press a printmaking and letterpress artist residency and publisher located in a remote hilltop village in the Metal Hills in Tuscany where he also tends to the production of extra vergin olive oil.
His works are in the permanent collection of the Library of Congress in Washington; the Antology Film Archives, the Center for Book Arts, the Leslie-Lohman Museum of Gay and Lesbian Art in New York City,
and in the Italian National Library in Florence.

TM