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PosterUnited Colors of Benetton.

Oliviero Toscani1992

1 2

1 Plakat, United Colors of Benetton.,1992, diverse Länder, Gestaltung:Oliviero Toscani, Fotografie:Lucinda Devlin. Abbildung: Museumfür Gestaltung Zürich / ZHdK.

2 Plakat, United Colors of Benetton.,1992, diverse Länder, Gestaltung:Oliviero Toscani, Fotografie: FrancoZecchin. Abbildung: Museum fürGestaltung Zürich / ZHdK.

With his polarizing Benetton campaigns, OlivieroToscani (b. 1942) demonstrated that even in the field ofcommercial advertising a new pictorial rhetoric iscapable of drawing attention. The photograph of a truckfilled with refugees was a vehement cry in the midst ofa consumerist public, raising awareness of a completelydifferent reality.

The toddler dangling helplessly in the air transfixes thegaze. Some of the refugees are already on the truck,others trying to scale its sides. A throng of peoplecarrying only the bare necessities completely surroundthe truck. But the reason why they are in flight is notthe subject here. The longstanding United Colors ofBenetton campaign started with innocuous images ofchildren from around the world. But Oliviero Toscaniincreasingly radicalized his pictorial message. In the1990s, he began to show select reportage photos ofpresent-day global sociopolitical events. People’sinevitable encounter with these images on city streetswas designed to provoke. Luciano Benetton devised this

marketing strategy together with Toscani, thus raisingthe question of whether it is legitimate to combinebusiness with social responsibility through advertisingmeans. This is a question that is even more pressingtoday, when there is so much talk of corporate socialresponsibility, but the issues are rarely aired in public.The photograph Toscani chose for this poster, and oneof an overloaded refugee ship on a Benetton posterfrom the same year, reveal that, even a quarter of acentury later, these images have lost nothing of theirtopicality. Although somewhat disillusioned these days,Toscani continues to call on companies to use theirimmense advertising budgets to draw public attentionto urgent social and political issues. (Bettina Richter)

Plakat, United Colors of Benetton., 1992Erscheinungsland: diverse LänderGestaltung: Oliviero ToscaniFotografie: Patrick RobertAuftrag: Benetton Group S.p.A., Ponzano Veneto, ITMaterial/Technik: Offsetdruck30 × 42 cmEigentum: Museum für Gestaltung Zürich / ZHdK

Museumfür GestaltungZürich

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