Last night, Oliver and I attended "Night of the Italians," a panel discussion between four prominent Italian designers. The panel was moderated by the ever-animated Paola Antonelli (Senior Curator in the Dept. of Architecture and Design at MoMA) and included design luminaries Louise Fili (Louise Fili Ltd.), Francesco Cavalli (LeftLoft), Matteo Bologna (Mucca Design) and Massimo Vignelli (Vignelli Associates).
It was an outstanding panel of inspiring designers, each with a different point of view on what it means to be an Italian designer living and working in New York. Of the four, Ms. Fili is the only designer who was born (to Italian parents) in the States. Bologna and Cavalli are from Milan and Vignelli is from Venice. While all said their designs are informed by Italian sights, scenes, culture and history, each admitted to finding it difficult to work in Italy, citing limitations in creativity, clients and finances.
Attendee, designer and blogger Henry Sene Yee posted a fun video showing Matteo Bologna's presentation, which adeptly illustrates why he finds the sort of graphic design sought after in Italy uninspiring.
However, despite choosing to live and work in New York, all feel trapped by their "Italian-ness," from time to time, as many of their clients are Italian and/or hire them to design Italian or Italian-like (perhaps pan-European) products, most notable in the cases of Fili and Bologna, who's portfolios sport many Italian/European-style food packaging, restaurant identities and book designs.
Toward the end of the evening, the discussion was opened to audience questions. Most were pretty basic and student-y, but maybe I'm just bitter because neither Oliver nor I were called on to ask ours. One student in particular managed to stun the panelists into silence until Bologna cut through it with his wit.
Student Question: What's more important, the image or the word?
Bologna's Answer: The kerning.
Funny and true! And, a nice segue to the "Kerning and Tracking" lecture Oliver would present at CCNY a few days later. Stay tuned for that post!
Our unanswered questions are as follows:
Oliver: With New York being such a tough, expensive, competitive place to live and work, at one point did each of you decide you were ready to start your own firms.
Killy: My question is more specifically for Mr. Vignelli, as he and his wife have been designing for so long and have tackled all aspects of design, including fashion, architecture, interiors, industrial design in addition to graphic design. Is it harder today to be a non-specialized designer across many fields without diluting quality or is it still possible to be a polymath designer taken seriously by the design world?
C'est la vie...
Following the discussion, Sicilian gelato from L'Arte del Gelato (with a logo designed by Loiuse Fili) and wine were served in the lobby.
Photo credit: http://www.lartedelgelato.com/press.html
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