There is no right way to react to cancer, so this editorial does not want to be the easy rhetoric about the smile with which Bianca Balti reacted to the disease. Everyone has their own way of dealing with an illness and they are all right, especially because it unites lives that are extremely distant in terms of means, tools, and possibilities. But those photos from yesterday, the ones in which Bianca smiles with a cannula in her arm in the ward, tell a lot about her personality, that of the most unconventional Italian model of recent years. A model who has revealed herself to be beautiful in the most unexpected ways, because she is capable of surprising, desecrating, sweeping away hypocrisy with a smile. Perhaps because she was the first to walk through shadows, as well as spotlights, and often voluntarily.

“They tell me I’m good at modeling, but even an idiot could do it”

The first time I saw Bianca Balti was during an episode of “Il Testimone” on Pif, that 2011 program that was the first to have the foresight to highlight characters who at the time were in the shadows and who would be the future. With her rickety camera and a narrative that was anything but set, the then young journalist met the equally young Matteo Renzi, Giorgia Meloni and others, including Bianca Balti: the result was unposed portraits that were at their best when the protagonists really knew how to put themselves on the line. And Bianca was unexpectedly among them: it was immediately clear that she only liked posed shots in her work. At the time she was 26, she would burst into sudden adolescent laughter and, waving her hands with ruined nail polish, she was already using the irreverent tones that would characterize her style: “People tell me I’m good at modeling, but good at what? You don’t have to do anything, if you’re photogenic you don’t have to do much. They put on your makeup, they dress you, you put your hand on your hip like this, you put a serious face and that’s it. Even an idiot could do that.” She was a light, in an environment that takes itself blatantly too seriously like fashion, in a world where people look at each other sideways backstage, maybe straightening their jacket. In short, Bianca Balti has always made me very cheerful. The cheerfulness of the outsider.

@mtvitalia No, not all models are serious, Bianca Balti is a clear example 🤩⚡ Happy birthday to you 💖 #BiancaBalti #IlTestimone #pif #davedere #tiktokfashion #life #model #mtvitalia #happybirthday ♬ original sound – mtvitalia

Model but anti-diva

Since then, she has never changed. She has always shown gratitude for her career and has not given in to the victim narratives that are so popular chic when you’ve reached the peak. Well, I personally have never been to places where you pay twenty thousand euros for a bag, but I think it takes a lot of ability to stay in touch with yourself. Spontaneity has remained one of her characteristics, so much so that it even surprised the “beast” Francesca Fagnani during one of her last interviews, but we’ll see about that later. After all, Balti didn’t look for fashion, it happened to her: a friend recommended a casting, then Dolce and Gabbana hired her as a muse, dressing her in a genuine but glamorous style that suited her like a glove, with lace and some concessions to kitsch. Born in the province of Lodi in 1984, one of the few to establish herself as an international top model, as well as the only Italian Victoria’s Secret angel (when it was still Victoria’s Secret), yet anti-diva, nonconformist. Later, she would have put her popularity at the service of the battle against cancer: “I have the BRCA1 mutation” she said a couple of years ago, “I will remove my uterus, ovaries and breasts for prevention”. She didn’t have time. Then she would also promote the topic of egg freezing, parenthood for singles. And of course, positioning on current issues is a topic that has been convenient for many people in these years of intense activism, but in her case it appeared genuine.

Bianca Balti and the tumor due to a genetic mutation: who should take the test

No victim mentality, but rather awareness

The fact is that when Bianca works in an “aspirational” sense, she is certainly more credible. She gives the air of a woman who has been able to forgive herself. I once read that Vasco Rossi is the only singer who can speak to those who have suffered and remain credible, despite being rolling in money. Here, Balti knows how to create empathy: she really was a wild girl, not like those models who, to give themselves an air of empathy, say that they were once tomboys. In that same interview with Pif, moreover, Balti spoke of her past as an illegal squatter, among rave and food picked up at the markets. “I avoid going to gala dinners, because I know I don’t know how to behave properly” she said in a Cinderella tone. A former supermarket hostess, her agent also saved her from addictions. “My ex-boyfriend was the drug dealer from Lodi, that’s how I got drugs at 14. I’ve had many addictions, actually all of them: smoking, drugs, alcohol, then the emotional one that I still haven’t overcome”. When she did her first casting, “I was very pale, I had a piercing in my nose and a shaved head”. A life that, she is keen to underline, she had chosen: there is no victimism in this, if anything awareness, if anything an invitation to be aware. At the time she described herself as a model who “can’t stand daddy’s boys”, then she would always make light of everything, in the world of fashion.

Two children, two marriages, emotional dependence, sexual favors

When Fagnani asked her what she liked about her job a few months ago, Bianca answered without mincing words: first of all, the money. “I like that my daughter doesn’t lack anything,” she explained. (She has two daughters, Matilde and Mia, born from two marriages; the one with Cristian Lucidi, married 6 months after their first meeting, and the one with Matthew McRae, with whom she was pregnant 8 months after their first meeting). When Fagnani asked her if she was afraid of getting old, she replied again: “I’m afraid of not becoming attractive, because I’ve always been and this opens doors for you. Not that I’ve ever asked for favors, but sometimes a smile is enough and it’s beautiful.” And in this hypocritical world that invented body positivity and then continues to have anorexic models on the catwalk, it’s oxygen. “I pray to my God to alleviate this passion of mine for penises,” he later said in the same interview, making the journalist’s eyes pop out, accustomed to demanding and obtaining truth from her “beasts” interviewees, but not so much. He had made the mistake of asking her if she had ever liked women. Shortly before, Balti had spoken of his ambivalent relationship with men, of addictions, of sexual favors in exchange for affection, of molestations and of a rape. He had commented like this, in a light but never superficial manner.

@itsnancyyc Bianca Balti on the set of Dsquared2 Spring/Summer 2011 Men’s Show #biancabalti #supermodel #fashion #funny #fyp #foryou ♬ bianca balti – Nancy

Bianca tries to sublimate her illness in the affection of her loved ones

Today Bianca tries to desecrate the disease in the hospital corridors, without disrespecting it. She tries to sublimate it by extolling the affection of her friends in these difficult days, she writes that “it was a week full of fear, pain and tears but above all love, hope, laughter and strength”. Many respond to her with affection on Instagram. Once we attacked Nadia Toffa for thanking cancer in a public post: she said that it had given her awareness; today we finally understood that there is no right or wrong way to react to cancer. And yet, I repeat, Bianca Balti has always brought me so much joy. And if that story of the sharing is caringor sharing which is caring, I hope her smile can also give a little to those who need it at this moment, because maybe they are living the same situation. Even if, Bianca has always confided, teasing herself a little, when she smiles she sees herself less beautiful than usual, but that doesn’t mean she stopped doing it.

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