Valente studied art at the Instituto di Belli Arte in Rome. Six years after emigrating to the U.S., in 1933 he became the staff photographer for Stage Magazine. Although his lack of fame as a photographer, according to Rafael Soyer, was attributed to Valente's preference for the company of artists, it ultimately probably won him the rare chance for a portrait sitting with Lord Joseph Duveen. Endorsements from celebrities such as Sol Hurok, who called Valente the Rembrandt of Photography, would have appealed to a prominent art dealer like Duveen, who bought and sold Old Master paintings of the highest caliber to a clientele that ranged from the most socially prominent to royalty on both continents. With establishments in Paris, London and New York, Duveen's enterprise was dubbed the House of Duveen. His death in 1939 was regarded as the end of an era in the art world.