George Clooney and Elisabetta Canalis have ended their two-year relationship. 
"We are not together anymore. It's very difficult and very personal, and we hope everyone can respect our privacy," Clooney and Canalis said in a joint statement Wednesday. 
Added Canalis's publicist: "It is a very personal and sad matter, and Elisabetta wants it to remain that way. She will be taking some time ... and then will face the press. She has not authorized me to say when the split happened." 
 The handsome couple made their romance official in September 2009 at the Venice Film Festival. Months later, the Italian star told PEOPLE she was enjoying life in the limelight with Clooney. "Yes, I love it!" she said. 
In May, they celebrated the actor's 50th birthday together in L.A. 

Elisabetta Canalis: I Had a 'Father-Daughter Relationship' with George Clooney
Elisabetta Canalis, the Italian TV personality who dated George Clooney for two years until their splitlast June, offers some surprising details about their relationship in Questo Amore (This Love), a new book by Italian journalist Bruno Vespa. 
Praising the Oscar winner, 50, as "the person who valued my feminine side the most" and "also one of the best people I have met from a charitable point of view," Canalis, 33, went on to say, "he has been a special for me, and very important, just as a father would be." 
Asked by Vespa to elaborate, she said, "between us there was more of a father-daughter relationship. I was unable to clarify this up 'til now." 
As for their breakup, Canalis – who competed on Dancing with the Stars earlier this season, denies reports that Clooney's long-held aversion to marriage was an issue. 
"George and I never spoke of marriage nor of having kids," she says. "I don't put limits to the possibility of having them, but neither George nor I had ever envisaged having kids together. The end of the relationship was not caused by a marriage issue, but instead by our personal needs." 
Although Clooney has since moved on with another Dancing alum, Stacy Keibler, Canalis has only kind words for him. 
"George is a real gentleman even in his private life," she says. "I was very much respected both as a woman and partner."