Posters, the forerunners of modern advertising – now done on TV, the internet, email-marketing and social media, were the first channel of communication directed at the masses. Through posters, which have always been tools with excellent visual impact, adorning the walls of cities, information of all kinds was and still is shared whether religious, political or advertising. One of the fathers of the advertising poster is Jules Chéret, the first to use color lithography to print posters for theaters, nightclubs and concert halls. He was the first to focus on images, relegating the text to the background, and the first to portray female figures, known as Chérettes. The widespread use of advertising posters was prompted, however, by the industrial revolution with the advent of the virtuous exchange between visual arts and publishing.
In Italy, at the end of the nineteenth century, Leopoldo Metlicovitz and Marcello Dudovich, Leonetto Cappiello and the German, Adolf Hohenstein, created posters in the pictorial style. The advertising of cars, clothes, spirits, tourist destinations, hotels and insurance companies began following in the footsteps of modernization, industrial production and the development of consumerism. In the 1930s, posters were influenced by the avantgarde movement, while in the post-war period with the economic boom, they were designed by creative agencies such as those of Armando Testa and Ernesto Carboni.
Today, these posters are rare and precious artifacts. This comes as no surprise given that their use was short-lived; just a few hundred copies were printed to be put up around the city, then when they were no longer needed, they were torn up and thrown away. The left-over copies were retained by the printer or artist who had created them. There are, however, two important places in Milan that prove that the poster was the advertising channel of preference in a wide variety of industrial sectors. The Mansutti Foundation and the Branca Collection have collected and preserved posters in order to encourage interest in and share a history that combines Italian art, customs, society and advertising.
Mansutti Foundation
The Mansutti Foundation can also be found in the historic center of Milan not far from the Duomo, the Royal Palace, Museo del Novecento and crypt of San Giovanni in Conca (a so-called “Aperti per Voi” place, made accessible to the public by the Italian Touring Club).
Francesco Mansutti, a lawyer and owner of the insurance brokerage company, Mansutti Spa, founded by his father in 1925, began collecting books on the history of insurance as a young boy. When he was still a high school student, he would find yellowing, dusty copies on the stalls around town, buy them and put them aside. Over time, he built up a library of 6,000 volumes, some of which dated back to the 15th and 16th centuries. They are now preserved by the Foundation that bears the Mansutti name, established in 2004. There are also 2,700 original insurance policies along with the books, however, in Via Rugabella, some of which are particularly intriguing. For example, there is one that was taken out in Calcutta in 1780 by English merchants who insured ten loads of opium, or one that Marilyn Monroe took out in 1962 with Travelers of Los Angeles. There are 200 insurance company shares from the nineteenth and twentieth centuries, mostly with splendid engravings, and 800 fire insurance marks donated to the Foundation between 2008 and 2013 by a Florentine collector. Lastly, the Foundation has more than 450 posters that tell the story of the development of the insurance industry in a more unusual way. They come from all over the world (Italy, France, Switzerland, the Netherlands, China, the United States, Canada and Russia) created by well-known illustrators such as Achille Beltrame, Umberto Boccioni, Erberto Carboni, Marcello Dudovich and Leopoldo Metlicovitz.
Here are some of these posters:
Cassa mutua cooperativa italiana per le pensioni, Turin
Artist: Adolf Hohenstein
Printed: Turin, Doyen, 1901
Size: 140×200 cm
Italian company CONCORDIA, Milan
Artist: Leopoldo Metlicovitz
Printed: Milan, Officine Ricordi, c.a. 1910
Size: 100×142 cm
Swiss company HELVETIA, Zurich
Artist: Umberto Boccioni
Printed: Milan, Officine Chiattone, c.a. 1914
Size: 34×48 cm
Italian company LA CREMONESE, Cremona
Artist: Erberto Carboni
Printed: Parma, S.A.F. Zafferi, 1924
Size: 79×95 cm
Italian company Riunione Adriatica di Sicurtà, Trieste
Artist: Marcello Dudovich
Printed: Milan, Star-Igap, 1934
Size: 60×100 cm
Italian company L’Assicuratrice italiana, Rome
Artist: Federico Seneca
Printed: Milan, Ripalta, c.a. 1935
Size: 46×67 cm
Italian company La Fenice, Venice
Artist: Anselmo Ballester
Printed: Milan, N. Moneta, 1941
Size: 100×139 cm
Italian company F.A.T.A. Fondo Assicurativo tra Agricoltori, Rome
Artist: Adolfo Busi
Printed: Milan, Officine Ricordi, 1955
Size: 70×100 cm
Branca Collection
Very close to Isola, Milan’s working-class district, which was a bit neglected until a decade ago, but now represents the new city. An area that has become very popular with tourists and has forever changed the Milanese skyline. Before entering the heart of the district which lies between the two northern ring roads, there is a building that takes up a whole block and retains the sober elegance of twentieth-century architecture, exuding the atmosphere of times gone by. This is the factory of the Fernet Branca liquor company, which also houses the Branca Collection, a space open to the visitors and a source of knowledge and inspiration for students of history of industrialization, marketing or graphic design. The exhibition includes machinery, stills, old bottles, photographs and documents, as well as calendars and posters. The company, founded 175 years ago, the brainchild of Bernardino Branca and the Swedish doctor, Fernet, has succeeded in conveying its brand identity in an informal but curated manner, adapting to the tastes of its consumers through the ages and becoming part of the collective imagination thanks to the use of the posters as a vehicle of communication. Created by illustrious names such as Metlicovitz, Cappiello, Jean d’Ylen, Mauzan and Codognato, Fernet-Branca’s calendars and posters are testimony to the great importance that the brand has placed on its image over the centuries. For example, Metilcovitz came up with the drawing of the eagle flying over our planet with a bottle of Fernet in its claws. This image would become the company’s logo in 1905.
The company is also closely linked to the history of architecture in Milan. These ties are represented by the Branca Tower in the heart of the Sempione Park: The first true example of a city on the rise. Designed by Gio Ponti, Torre Branca was built in little more than two months in 1933, to mark the 5th edition of the Milan Triennial. It was originally called Torre Littoria and was used as a lighthouse with a bar at the top. It became unusable in 1972. In 1985, Fratelli Branca fully funded the restoration of the tower, which earned the company the privilege of having this architectural masterpiece named after it.
Here are some of these posters:
Italia Turrita – 1922, by Jean D’Ylen, pseudonym of Jean Paul Beguin
A turreted Italy presents itself to the world, represented by the flags below.
Alligator – 1920s, Giuseppe Magagnoli’s MAGA agency
Legend has it that crocodiles cry after they have eaten… But the Branca crocodile smiles, holding a bottle of Fernet-Branca
The King of Bitters – 1920s, by Leonetto Cappiello
King Louis dressed in bottles of Fernet-Branca. The highly acclaimed designers of posters reigned supreme in Paris at the time. Cappiello immediately adopted the popular style, collaborating as a caricaturist producing various posters.
1887 Calendar
The flag bears the address of the original headquarters, later relocated to the historic Via Broletto – still the company’s address today and indicated on the product label. A sophisticated woman is setting off to cross the ocean sitting on crates of product en route to various destinations. The captain offers her a glass of Fernet-Branca to relieve her seasickness.
Woman with basket
Printed by G. Ricordi and C of Milan. Attributed to the 1920-30s
King Carpano with the Piedmontese statesman, Cavour (1956)
King Carpano makes a toast with Napoleon – The series was reprinted several times from 1951 onwards
King Carpano toasts with Giuseppe Verdi – After the great success of the first series of historical toasts, Testa and Carpano decided to pay homage to the famous composer (second half of the 1950s)
Il punto e mezzo: Punt e Mes (a bitter aperitif) was the historic subject of Testa’s agency at the beginning of 1970’s.
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