Roberta Valtorta is a historian and photography critic, vice president of the SISF (Italian Society for the Study of Photography), and a member of the scientific committee of the journal RSF. A key figure in the Italian photography scene, she curated the Archivio dello Spazio project for the Province of Milan and contributed to the creation of the photographic archives of the Lombardy Region.
She was the scientific director of the Museum of Contemporary Photography in Cinisello Balsamo-Milan, which she designed and led from 2004 to 2015, and directed the photography book series fotografia Art& (Udine). She also taught courses at the University of Rome Tor Vergata, the University of Udine, and the Polytechnic University of Milan, and has been teaching continuously since 1984 at the CFP Bauer in Milan.
Throughout her career, she has curated numerous exhibitions in Italy and Europe and published significant theoretical and historical essays on photography, exploring it as a cultural asset, artistic expression, and tool for interpreting the territory.