Catalogue Number
NMLH.2022.132
Object Name
Poster
Title
Italian Socialist Party Poster - explanation of collection continued
People
Bettino Craxi
Date
1980
Description
This poster is part of a collection of 100 posters designed by Ettore Vitale for the Italian Socialist Party (PSI) between 1973 and 1991. The posters promote a range of events and campaigns using the colours of the Italian flag- red, white, and green, along with motifs of carnations, rainbows, and stars. This poster is titled "l'immagine socialista cento manifesti disegnati da ettore vitale per direzione del partito socialista italiano" which translates to "the socialist image one hundred posters drawn by ettore vital for leadership of the italian socialist party." This poster has a white background and is full of black text - this is in Italian. The English translation of this text is as follows"This exhibition adds other images to the now centennial history of socialist graphics and iconography. they are very beautiful and effective images that re-propose to the visitor the posters created in recent years by Ettore Vitale for the communication and image office of the party. The PSI has always followed with particular attention problems related to the visualization of its messages, entrusting the graphics of the party to the care of a qualified professionalism, thus creating a coordinated image that has established itself for its clarity and incisiveness, for its rigor and its moderation. not therefore electoral campaigns, posters for conferences and initiatives, brochure covers and leaflets unrelated to each other, difficult to identify as products of the same party, but communications, coordinated and therefore more effective. it was and it is a socialist image that aroused interest and attention not only in the party and in the voters, but also among advertising "experts", graphic designers, communication professionals. the reformist choices of the eighties, which led the PSI to re-appropriate its historical, cultural and political heritage better and more deeply, have therefore had an effective visualization. the integration between political message and visual language, between the content of communication and the forms of communication itself, has been very strong and effective in recent years: visiting this exhibition you have a clear demonstration of this. a few years after the new century, the PSI is preparing to celebrate its hundredth anniversary: ??the oldest of the Italian parties, thanks to its politics and its image, and today more than ever the most youthful." The end of the text has a signature belonging to Bennito Craxi - an Italian politician, leader of the Italian Socialist Party from 1976 to 1993 and the 45th prime minister of Italy from 1983 to 1987. He was the first Italian Socialist Party member to become prime minister and the third from a socialist party to hold the office.
