Davide Sorrenti's Journals Reveal Fragments of a Restless Life

"Widely credited with reshaping what fashion imagery could look like in the 90s, Davide exposed the industry to a darker, more intimate sensibility, accessed via a keen understanding of the street (having grown up in 80s New York, where he moved from Naples as a kid), and an amplified relationship with mortality. Furnished with bittersweet anecdotes, the film additionally relays his early interest in photography and the creative community he fell in with."

""He had two very big, destroyed journals," says Davide's mother, the photographer Francesca Sorrenti. "They weren't private. When friends came over, they were going through them. They were very based on his friendships." Born with a rare blood disorder called thalassemia, Davide died in 1997, aged 20; his journals, as a result, speak uniquely to how he saw and engaged with the world, embodying the same energy that Sorrenti and others remember on screen ("He was a juvenile delinquent angel," she says affectionately)."

""We did the first book basically right after the documentary," Sorrenti continues. "We were so amazed by the following, and the amount of people that came [to screenings] was unbelievable. In New York, we did three showings, and at the first there was a massive storm that flooded New York - the theatre was packed. I'm like, 'Davide, where did this all come from?'. At Dover Street Market [for the"

Friends and family recount memories of photographer Davide Sorrenti through archival footage and testimony. Sorrenti reshaped 1990s fashion imagery with a darker, more intimate sensibility rooted in 1980s New York street life and a heightened awareness of mortality. His torn, communal journals document friendships, creative experiments, early interest in photography, and raw visual thinking. Born with thalassemia, Sorrenti died in 1997 at age 20, which intensified the poignancy of his work. His mother, photographer Francesca Sorrenti, edited and is releasing Davide Sorrenti Journals: Volume 01 1994–1995 through Idea, following renewed public interest after screenings.

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