Italian commercial posters between advertising and art

With a starting date in 1926 (the year in which Depero exhibited the Venice Biennale a “quadro pubblicitario”, Squisito al selz) and an ideal closing date in 1957 (the year in which the television advertising show Carosello first aired on Italy’s public tv network RAI), the exhibition will illustrate how the design of Italian commercial posters moved hand in hand with the artistic currents of its times. While poster art has often been described as derivative in character, the show will demonstrate how, from Futurism onwards, Italian posters acquired a visual and communicative force that elevated the medium to a form of artistic expression in its own right, pushing the boundaries of lithographic techniques, photomontage, and typography. The commercial posters’ peculiar ambition to deliver alluring forms and contents to the masses, rather than to an elite circle, also makes them an object of socioeconomic and philosophical interest.

Event Venue & Nearby Stays

Center for Italian Modern Art, 421 Broome Street, New York, United States