A talk with Giulia Brivio (Artphilein, Studio Boîte)

The first event in the new series "Women with a Camera (and a Typewriter): The Editorial Work" features Giulia Brivio, an editor and curator who, together with Federica Boragina, founded the publishing project Studio Boîte (Milan, Italy), and who works at Artphilein Editions (Lugano, Switzerland). The first, founded in 2009 by Giulia Brivio and Federica Boragina, is a research and publishing initiative dedicated to contemporary visual arts: until 2018, Studio Boîte published the eponymous magazine “in scatola”, a project that brought together images and texts to explore 20th- and 21st-century art, whilst since 2014 it has focused on producing artist’s books and publishing projects in support of contemporary research, with particular attention to forms of storytelling linked to current issues — civil rights, gender issues, ecology, memory — often addressed through intimate and personal perspectives. Since 2017, Studio Boîte has been curating, together with BASE Milano, The Art Chapter – Milan Art Book Fair. The second organisation Giulia Brivio will tell us about, in her capacity as curator-in-charge, is the Artphilein Foundation, a cultural centre dedicated to contemporary photography, art and independent publishing. Founded in Lugano in 2013 by Caterina and GianFranco De Pietri, it comprises a public library of photobooks with over 4,000 volumes, three exhibition spaces — Focus, La Piscina and Censura —, the publishing house Artphilein Editions and a specialist bookshop.

The event, moderated by the curators, will take place in person and is open to the public. 

A virtual room can be set up on request for valid reasons (physical distance, study commitments abroad, health issues, etc.) by emailing ficlit.textl@unibo.it to receive a personal invitation link.

Giulia Brivio (1981) is a curator, editor and producer specialising in artist’s books and photography. In 2025, she co-founded, together with the artist Ako Atikossie, the Togo Photo Festival, a biennial dedicated to West African photography in Lomé, Togo. Since 2013, she has been photo-book editor and chief curator at Artphilein, based in Lugano/Paradiso. In 2009, she co-founded Studio Boîte, a publishing house and research platform on editorial practices. From 2018 to 2022, she taught Editorial Design at NABA – Nuova Accademia di Belle Arti in Milan. Previously, from 2011 to 2014, she was Project Manager at the Fiorucci Art Trust, where she curated the Volcano Extravaganza residency programme in Stromboli. From 2005 to 2011, she worked as head of the Italian Artists’ Archive at Viafarini DOCVA. She obtained a diploma in Visual Design from the Accademia Noésis and a degree in Arts and Performing Arts Sciences and Technologies from the Università Cattolica, with a thesis on Narrative Art and Sophie Calle.