Fifty years ago, an Italian photographer named Tazio Secchiaroli became the symbol of a new generation of photographers. His nom de guerre was Paparazzo and he was the photographic bounty hunter of the Via Veneto in Rome in the 1950s. Secchiaroli was the first of the paparazzi, immortalised by Federico Fellini in his 1960 film La Dolce Vita. Calling himself an ?��Ǩ?�assault photographer?��Ǩ��, Secchiaroli sped up and down the Via Veneto on his Vespa, chronicling illicit love affairs, orgies and feasts in papal Rome, then the international capital of cinema, the nobility and Hollywood?��Ǩ�Ѣs glamour jet set.

Secchiaroli had a nose for news and a highly trained eye that could sum up a whole story in a single picture. He created a style of photography that became the basis of a worldwide and enduring school.

?��Ǩ?�Secchiaroli sparked the development of a whole new aesthetic in photography,?��Ǩ�� says the art dealer James Hyman, whose gallery opens Brigitte Bardot and the Original Paparazzi, a show of early pap photography, on Thursday. ?��Ǩ?�There were whole gangs of them speeding around Rome chasing celebrities on their Vespas.?��Ǩ��

Until October 3, 2009 at the James Hyman Gallery, 5 Saville Row, London, W1S 3PD

Here’s an amazing clip for her song “Contact”:

Via World of Kane