Gianluca Farinelli, the founder and chief of the Bologna Film Archives and its celebrated film restoration lab, has been appointed artistic director of the David di Donatello awards — Italy's equivalent of the Oscars. The board of the Fondazione Accademia del Cinema Italiano approved the appointment on Wednesday, August 5, 2026 (Variety; David di Donatello Academy).

Farinelli is best known in Italian film circles as the driving force behind Il Cinema Ritrovato, a Bologna-based festival dedicated to cinematic treasures of the past — restored prints, forgotten classics, archival rediscoveries. He also founded the Bologna Film Archives and its restoration laboratory, which has become one of Europe's most respected film-preservation operations (Variety).

He steps into a post previously held by Piera Detassis, a film journalist who in 2018 became the first woman to lead the David di Donatello awards. Detassis held the dual role of president of the academy and artistic director; her mandate formally expired, and she has stepped down. Rather than hand both jobs to one successor, the academy has split them (Variety).

The week before Farinelli's appointment, Silvia Calandrelli — a high-ranking executive at Italy's state broadcaster RAI — was named president of the Italian cinema academy, the more ceremonial of the two roles (Variety). The board that approved Farinelli's appointment is presided by Calandrelli and composed of Francesco Giambrone (President of AGIS, the Italian live-entertainment association), Alessandro Usai (President of ANICA, the national film industry association), Giorgio Carlo Brugnoni (Director General for Cinema and Audiovisual at the Ministry of Culture), and Salvatore Nastasi (President of SIAE, the Italian society of authors and editors) (David di Donatello Academy).

On the same day as Farinelli's appointment, SIAE became a Founding Adherent Member of the Fondazione Accademia del Cinema Italiano (David di Donatello Academy).

In a statement, Farinelli thanked Calandrelli and the entire board of directors of the Fondazione Accademia del Cinema Italiano for the appointment (Variety).

The David di Donatello is Italy's top national film award, presented annually by the Academy of Italian Cinema. The artistic director shapes the ceremony's creative direction — the format, the programming, the tone of the broadcast.

Bringing in a man whose career has been built on looking backwards at cinema's past, to steer the look and feel of its present-tense celebration, is the choice the academy has made. What Farinelli does with that stage will be visible at the next ceremony.