Biography
Davide Gambino was born in Italy and studied Audiovisual Communication at the University of Palermo from 2003 to 2006. From 2009 to 2012 he trained at the Centro Sperimentale di Cinematografia in Rome. He made music clips, commercials and image films, as well as several short documentaries on art and culture topics, for example "La vita nell'arte" (IT 2012), about the artist Alberto Burri (1915-1995). For his 55-minute documentary "Pietra Pesante" (IT 2013), about a Sicilian shepherd who simultaneously creates archaic works of art, he was awarded Best Young Italian Filmmaker 2013 by the New York Film Academy. In 2015 he realized the ten-part documentary series "Il bar del Cassarà", about a group of young Sicilians who open a special bar in Palermo. In addition, over the years Gambino shot numerous short documentaries for art and cultural institutions such as the Conservatorio di Musica in Palermo (2014) and the Museo A. Salinas (2016) in Palermo. In 2017, he joined the Palermo-based production company Mon Amour Films, which he has since directed with founder Ruggerio Di Maggio.
In 2020, Gambino's feature-length documentary "The Second Life - Das zweite Leben" was screened at Munich's DOK.fest. In the film, he depicts the work of world-famous taxidermists in a way that is both accurate and poetic. Due to the Corona pandemic, the German theatrical release was not until April 2022. Even before that, in September 2021, Gambino's six-part Netflix documentary series "Vendetta: guerra nell'antimafia," about anti-mafia activists who suddenly find themselves facing criminal charges, was shown.