Giovanni Pintori (1912 - 1999) pubblicità come arte

The exhibition on Giovanni Pintori is part of the trend of the masters of ‘graphic design’.

The m.a.x. museum in Chiasso, in collaboration with the MAN_Museo d'Arte Provincia di Nuoro, presents an exhibition on this artist, investigating him through a sort of ‘graphic tale’ and highlighting his modernity of design and creative choices. The latter are always constructed in a precise and conscious manner, yet set in a dynamic and fluid path. Light, colour, composition and creative play constitute his main areas of research, which bring his graphics ‘to the fore as a metaphorical unicum of communication’, in the words of Paul Rand.

The exhibition at the m.a.x. museum traces the artist's creative and professional career, showing the ideational process from which the projects that have characterised his career, ranging from the creation of posters, to playbills, to corporate identity, to logotypes for companies, have sprung. On display, organised according to a thematic-chronological criterion, are over one hundred and fifty pieces including sketches, sketches, watercolour drawings, letterheads, posters and various publications.

Giovanni Pintori was born in 1912 in Tresnuraghes (Oristano). After attending the ISIA (Istituto Superiore Industrie Artistiche di Monza) together with fellow countrymen Salvatore Fancello and Costantino Nivola, in 1936 he began working with the Olivetti Advertising Technical Office, of which he became head in 1940, linking his name to the image of the Ivrea-based company in a long and successful series of posters, advertising pages, outdoor signs, stands. In 1950 he obtained the first of a long list of awards: the Palme d'Or from the Italian Advertising Federation and became Olivetti's Art Director, enjoying the esteem and direct relationship with Adriano Olivetti. In 1962 (two years after Adriano Olivetti's death) Pintori received another prestigious international award: the Typographic Excellence Award from the Type Directors Club of New York, followed in 1964 by the Certificate of Merit from the Art Directors Club of New York. In 1966 a large solo exhibition was dedicated to him in Tokyo. He died in Milan on 15 November 1999 and left a photographic and documentary archive of fundamental importance for the study of industry-related advertising graphics in the five decades from 1930 to 1980.